Uncharted
by aracelitaapple27
Summary: A love story told between years apart and war, between lands and hopes. Many years after Andrea left Miranda in Paris, she dares to leave her again on the steps of the airport in Mexico City, but the fault is not all hers, they both are to blame. Perhaps it wasn't meant to be.
1. Chapter 1

It was almost apocalyptic, so beautiful it took her breath away, it made her smile in the most unexpected moments, it made her complacent and it was so dark it twisted her heart and tore at the skin around her wrists, it made her elegiac and mournful and mad.

It wasn't love, not right now, it hadn't been for a long time.

She was all alone, wrapped in a cheap scarf that scratched at her arms and did little to protect against the temperamental Mexican cold. The outskirts of what had been a town not so long ago was filled with mountains, that towered over and from her view point seemed to touch the sky. Gentle giants, glowing with yellow and lilac field flowers that seemed unaware of the destruction all around them. Her grandmother hated field flowers, she suddenly remembered and the memory caught her by surprise. She missed her grandmother, those carefree days spent in her large home in the capital, and the hacienda in the summers. Idyllic, those years growing up without traces of violence or loss had never lived up to the promises they claimed.

She shook her head, brown curls bounced down her shoulder, the sun was setting over 'La Nevada' as the locals called the vast expanses of mountain territory, it was time to head home.

Andrea chuckled somewhat bitterly, what she called home but was just a tent, pitched against the mountain side, a few metal scraps covering her from the cold and old mattresses she had dragged uphill to sleep on. The unwanted tear rolled down her dirty face and she wiped away at it angrily. She hadn't found anything cheap at the market today, a kind vendor had given her an apple for nothing in return, rare for these days of war and trouble.

"It's only momentary," she told herself as she dragged the large sheet of wool over her body and lay down to sleep for the day.

~ 10 years ago~

"Don't be silly Andrea, everyone want's this. Everyone wants to be us" the fashion tycoon had said in her velvet soft voice and glided out of the car into the hoard of expectant paparazzi. Andrea had waltzed away shaking her head, angry for believing in Miranda. She thrown her phone into the Paris fountain and taken the next plane back home.

Once in New York, she had found the emptiness intolerable, she wanted nothing more than to call Miranda and tell her … Miranda would think it was madness.

No, the iconic fashion influencer, would never love her back. There was no point in letting her know and yet Andrea had left her standing on the streets of Paris, without an assistant and a moment of shock, that made no sense either.

She penned a letter in monogramed stationary, and fountain ink.

It wasn't long and flowery, she didn't use any of the skills she had learned in journalism at Northwestern, she didn't' embellish with details about how her love would no doubt be unrequited, she didn't even make it a paragraph.

'Miranda, I love you, I have loved you for a long time and I believe I will always love you. That's why I left, I could not bear to be so close and yet so far. What a cliché right?"

Yours always,

Andrea Sachs.

The lettered accompanied a large bouquet of white roses. That was it, no petition for forgiveness, no lunch date requested, simply a declaration of love.

Andrea had the flowers and the lettered delivered, she waited for the confirmation that they had been delivered and then she boarded the 8hour flight to Los Angeles, as far away as she could get. In the long hours that transcribed during the flight from Paris to New York, Andrea had felt restless, all the security she had before, the garb she had thrown at Miranda during the initial interview about journalism being her dream was lost. In the whole year she had been with Elias Clarke she hadn't thought about journalism at all, if she was honest with herself she had thought about staying at Runway, maybe pursuing editorial or another fashion career. Her whole world had tilted on axis when she had darted across the hallway and asked Nigel to help her.

She took a deep breath the lights on the airplane to dimmed, she would study law. She would call her father, Richard Sachs, and tell him she was going back to law school. If she couldn't stay with Miranda and be happy, she'd at least make her family proud and lots of money while she was at it.

As she imagined the process had been a breeze, Richard Sachs knew people a USC, she was a legacy and with a few phone calls and some apartment hunting Andrea had been all settled in Los Angeles.

The city was just as she remembered from her college tour, dotted with glitz and infatuation. Around the University the clash of opulence and poverty strung high, the graduate condos where she was staying towered over the newly inaugurated USC village and yet a few blocks away homeless in their tents and scavenged mattresses slept their days away, bathed in urine and sweat from the hot Californian days.

She shook her head as Natalie talked about the party last night and how she was going to love the classes at USC.

"Are you tired Andrea?" the young blonde turned slightly toward her companion, not really taking her eyes of the road. Andrea had been in Los Angeles for a month waiting for the fall semester to start, the only person she knew so far was Natalie the USC president's daughter, two years her senior and her last year at USC Kent School of Medicine. She was the picture perfect southern Californian. She had water blue eyes that sparkled in the light, her skin was alluring white and her light blond hair dripped gold in curls. She smiled often and her personally bubbled over with the candor of summer nights spent by the beach. She always wore sundresses and wedge sandals and every time she got out of her midnight blue Maserati she swung her legs over like ladies do.

Andrea loved to study her, she could do a portrait piece on her, she could write a whole book about her. The only part that kept Andrea from not going out to lunches and parties with Natalie aside from her loneliness was the feeling that the young woman was sincere in her affinity toward Andrea.

"I am a little, but I'm sure once I have a drink or two I will fine" she sighed staring out the mural walls of downtown LA, they were going to a studio party in universal city, the signs read Mulholland drive, and Hollywood Bowl, they did nothing to stir even a second glance for Natalie but Andrea still felt a certain whiz about being in tinsel town. She mentally laughed at the irony of life, New Yorkers dream about Los Angeles with its aquamarine waters and 70 degree weather and Los Angelinos dream about New York with Times Square, Broadway and snow white Christmases.

At the party, between a Gin Martini and a question about what designer she was wearing, someone mentioned they should take Andrea to Disneyland.

"It is a must for any out of towner"

She begrudgingly agrees to go probably due to the third Martini and the soft jazz music. The semester approaches fast and Natalie decides they should go two days before the first day.

The days is a whirlwind to say the least, the walk down Main Street is entertaining until Nicole keeps stopping at every corner for food, first at the red cart to the right, where she swears the sell the best corn dogs ever, they dart over to the Tikki Room for a semi claustrophobic experience of fake birds singing and thunder rolling and a Dole Whip cone. They take a ride down the Rivers of America in a safari boat of all things and when they exit the somewhat distracting ride where Andrea questions the sanity of Walt as he made that ride, they hop over to buy beignets shaped like mini Mickey heads.

"Do we gain weight on all of this?" Andy asks

Natalie, who at this point, is wearing Zebra Mickey ears, along with her USC V-neck and some ripped jeans that have glitter down the side, laughs and nods "don't worry we will walk it off, do you want a drink?" she asks.

"Sure, don't we have to leave the park though?"

She shakes her head and guides them down the alley behind the beignet restaurant, past a store that sells all the Haunted House souvenirs where at Natalie's insistence the brunette buys Mickey ears too, with ghosts on them and then she knocks at an unassuming blue door. The number 33 is all that it alludes to and Andrea is about to ask, when someone opens the door and lets them in.

"Ms. Aster it's been so long, the Mendoza's where here last week and asked about you," the cheerful door opener says and Natalie smiles,

"I haven't seen them in ages, school is keeping me busy. Is Charles here?" she asks hurriedly adverting her gaze.

The attendant whose name seems to be Liliane nods and without even questioning guides them upstairs to the bar.

"Charles Darling" she shouts and the bartender, a young blonde and very handsome man looks up and smiles.

"Nikki dear!"

The USC student sits down at the stool by the bar, the restaurant looks like something out of a 1950's glamour movie. The chairs are made of leather, the walls hold pictures of ghosts with jazz instruments and if you play close attention they disappear and reappear behind the bar. It is all a play off the Haunted House and the New Orleans Square. Andy finds it oddly comforting that Natalie and the barman know each other and they spend a few minutes talking leaving her to her own thought at the lounge chaise a few steps away.

"Walt used to sit by that window you know?" the blond man speaks suddenly, appearing by the table with two drinks and a menu. Natalie trailed behind, "she's not a huge Disney fan Char" she says as if she has known him forever.

"Where are you from, Ms.…?" he asks

"Sachs, " she offers her last name

"Ms. Sachs"

"Chicago" she states.

"Chicago? Mob city" he smiles

"that's why I'm going to be a lawyer, lots of money" she affirms and they all laugh.

"Well I'm off to ring in your food" he states and walks away

"You know him?" Andrea questions, she hadn't meant to, she usually doesn't meddle in lives.

Her older friend looks at her and nods, "we used to date"

"before Grant?" again Andrea is unsure of where the curiosity seems to come from, she sips her yellow drink wondering what it is and why it's so sugary.

Natalie seems to like the interest, maybe it makes her feel Andrea really cares.

"During Grant, before Grant. It is a long story"

Andrea nods "I didn't mean to"

"Don't worry, I have come to terms with it, my family wants something and that is what they get"

"I understand" she says

Suddenly her eyes darken and look downward, she drinks the yellow drink faster than she meant to, the mix of alcohol and sugar make her momentarily dizzy and she keeps quiet.

"This isn't New York, Andrea' Nicole says quietly

Andrea looks up, her chocolate brown eyes glassed over, trying to hold the tears.

"what do you mean?"

"I mean no fancy Miranda here to break your heart. You have to let her go. I have watched you since you came, the nostalgia and sadness in your eyes and though you never mention her… anyone would know. I'm I wrong? Is that not why you left New York, packed up your life, decided on a new career? Aren't you trying to forget her?"

Her friend's words are not hard, and they don't mean to hurt but they do. Andrea nods, "no you're not wrong"

"She doesn't deserve you to hurt over her, just like Char doesn't deserve to hurt over me. We've made choices Andrea. Miranda made hers now you live your life"

The school years pass faster than she remembered the first time around, despite their differences Natalie and her become the closest of friends, perhaps because despite those difference deep inside they were the same, caving to their families desires of them.

"congratulations" the blonde woman now doctor states arriving late to the party with a small bag in her hand. She hugs Andrea, and with her free hand reaches for a glass of champagne.

"Thank you," the brunette nods and smiles uncharacteristically

"I heard you passed the bar"

"not as big as an accomplishment as saving lives everyday" Andrea smiles

"You'll be saving lives in a different way" her bubbling Californian friend states

"I don't think so, in Chicago it will be more like saving corrupt politicians from jail"

they both laugh and walk over to the window of the large USC hall, it looked out into the peak hour streets, Figueroa Avenue teaming with cars, bumper to bumper cars, and people walking around in a hurry. Across the street stood the Natural History Museum which Andrea loved to wander into when she felt sad.

"So you decided" Natalie asks but it is more of a statement

"Andrea nods, "yes, but not my father's firm. I have an offer from Lockhart and associates.

"I'm impressed little one, "Natalie sais and before the conversation can get gloomier she asks "you'll come back for the wedding right?"

"Of course," Andrea answers, her friend is referring to her marriage to Garret, the family approved boyfriend that Nicole has been holding for years now, years in which she had a fling with Charles, years which have been miserable to her.

Andrea opts to now say a word about it, tonight is not the night. She doesn't say a thing the following year when the wedding happens, or when Nicole calls her the following morning to avoid spending time with her new husband.

"Come visit me," she pleads

"I'll try my best' Andrea quips but the truth is she doesn't want to face her friend. She won't be able to hold her thoughts much longer, she won't be able to stop herself from saying that Natalie did the wrong thing. She's going to make Garret miserable, and she's lying to herself. She wants to say that Nicole's marriage is either going to end in divorce or many trips to the therapist but she can't in good conscience give advice. She is miserable herself, still holding on to a memory of something that never was…. A dry chuckle escapes her and she lets the silver pen fall from her hand into the desk. It's been two years since Natalie got married. She calls her often, more often than Andrea things it is logical or sane for a newlywed to call. Every time they talk, her doctor friend talks about taking her niece to Disneyland, she never mentions Charles but Andrea knows that is the only reason why Nicole goes. When she's not taking Sabrina to the park, she is going to medical conferences, more medical conferences than are necessary. Still Andrea kept quiet just as Natalie kept quiet about Miranda.

"Andrea it's been three years since I saw you, my father is retiring we're having a shin-ding won't you please come? He'd love to see you?"

It's is an early phone call from her best friend, if she's honest her only friend. Andrea agrees, perhaps because she feels lonely, the four tidy walls of her downtown apartment with meticulous patterns and broad mirror and the decorator had suggested make her feel nostalgic.

She hates loving Miranda, hates that is she has in the last six years gone out with less people than she can count with her fingers. Maybe she accepts because she was feeling relaxed lounging in her warm sheets late into the morning on a day she had taken out of the office, maybe it is because she still has the rosy color and blood flowing from touching herself hard and rough as she imagined running her hands through someone else's hair. She sighs.

"So that's a yes?"

Andrea looks out toward the window snow has started to fall, light airy snowflakes twirling down in a haze. Perhaps she said yes because the cool California breeze and sun upon her feet sounds a lot better than here.

"Yes"

Natalie is thrilled she gabs on about a shopping day and time to meet the family dog Russel.

Andrea listens to her friend quietly, but her thoughts still wonder somewhere else, they always do. They wonder to Miranda, they wonder about what she might be doing at that moment, running a fashion shoot? Writing the editors letter? Having Starbucks? Or has she changed her coffee preferences? Does she still dine at that little restaurant near her townhome? Is she spending time with Caro and Cass? The girls must be so big now, almost 18. So much has happened since she was an assistant at the towering magazine conglomerate and yet her thoughts like in the early days still went back to the Dragon Lady. Would they ever go away? Would they ever stop?

The ex-journalist often wondered about that, would there be a point when her heart stopped gasping for breath, when it stopped aching? Would she find the right person someday?

She would stay up at night, fingers clicking away at her silver thin laptop and write … write poems about her, the allusive Ice Queen. Sometimes the poems turn dark, and they run long and she feels the warmth of tears roll down her cheeks. She closes the laptop with gentle thud echoes in her lonely room and she turns to grab notes on district court.

~ California

She walks down the beach, far enough from the ocean to not get wet but close enough to hear the roar, to feel the salt splashes, to see the tumult of the white foam against the sand. She has missed the ocean, the careless abandon it brings. She walks with her shoes in her hand, and her straightened hair wiping gentle at her sunglasses as the wind hits her face.

"Expensive Shoes" she hears a voice come from very near, two steps away. Andrea had been so caught up in her own thoughts, that she did not see the stranger approach. The beach had not been deserted yet it wasn't crowded. There had been a few lingering families and two or three couples catching the view, but the sky was foggy and the sun barely peaked. There was a chill that ran down the ocean and it was not an ideal day to be on the beach. The stranger was a tall man, early 30's, scruffy bear and eyes that could match the ocean.

Andrea shrugs and smiles oddly at the man, semi bothered to be interrupted in her thoughts.

"You don't look like you were dressed for the beach" he continues to speak and Andrea lets him. She hasn't had a conversation with anyone all day. She looks down at her Louboutin red sole shoes that she was holding in her hand, the black wide leg batiste pants and the organza shirt flowing underneath the white tweed jacket. She looked like she was ready to storm the boardroom not walk melancholy down the sand. The truth is, she was going to do some work for Lockhart and associates, in only three years she had only lost 3 cases at the firm, her first three, she was on the track to become partner and the firm was looking to expand to the West Coast. She was going to do some research while she was here, but the memories had gotten the better part of her, she had pulled over at the beach, taken her shoes off and walked down regardless of what onlookers thought.

"I wasn't coming to the beach, "she finally finds her voice, "I … it was a whim. I was doing some work"

"Work, in Louboutin and Chanel jackets? What do you do?" he asks. His insistence and outright curiosity does not bother Andrea, it reminds her of Natalie, maybe it's a SoCal trait she thinks.

"I'm a lawyer" she releases slowly.  
"A lawyer, wow… you looked very deep in thought there, hard case?" he asks

Andrea shakes her head, "not really, I'm not out here for work. I came to see a college friend."

"Ah on vacation, workcation? Where are you from?" he asks

She had expected the question, "Chicago" she answers. She realizes she isn't walking anymore. She has stopped, she stopped the second the stranger spoke to her, but she just realized it.

"What does your friend do out here? Far from home?"

"She's a doctor, I went to college here at USC. Her dad is retiring I came to see her" Andrea explains as if he had a need to understand all of this.

"So, what alluded your thoughts so? In my, experience there are only a few reasons a broken heart or family loss?" he asks

Andrea starts walking slowly again, swinging in the tiniest her shoes.

"Not loss" she states

"A broken heart then?"

"I don't know that it can be called that" she says there are rocks approaching, black and glistening from the water. They must turn around, the end of the sand had started.

"What would you call it?"

"Something that never was, never started, "

"Ah unrequited love" he sighs

"I don't know if it's unrequited" she explains as if it made it better

"Well… I can tell you "

"From experience again?" she quips sarcastically.

He laughs, a nervous laugh, the kind that darts a glance and quickly covers it looking away.

She smiles, "yes" he answers and the answer is a pause a longing pause, a pregnant pause.

"My fiancée died two weeks before our wedding," he states ending with a dry chuckle, the kind that makes you feel hopeless.

"I'm so sorry" Andrea says. She has always though that saying I'm sorry when someone else's mother, lover, anyone dies is fake, they can't' possibly be sorry, they don't know how you feel. This time she means it, she does not know what this man is feeling, or felt but she's sorry that he had to go through that.

"It was a long time ago, which leads me to what I was going to say. Time, time makes everything bearable" he nods as they 180 and walk back to the point where they met.

"How did she die?" Andrea asks

"Car accident" he answers as if she had asked what was for dinner.

"I don't know that time will work for me" she muses after a beat

He turns, his eyes are now lighter as if telling her that confession has taken a weight of his shoulders.

"It works for everyone" he says

"I don't know why I'm telling you all this" she wonders out loud, switching her shoes and pulling out a hair tie to pull he hair up and out of her face.

"Sometimes it's easier to tell a stranger, someone who know nothing about your life."

She tilts her head up, Dior sunglasses cover half her face, she smiles the corner of her red stained lips curve and she nods takin a deep breath.

"Maybe you're right" she pauses "I've loved them for six years, "

"do they know?" he asks

"Yes, "she deadpans

"And they said no? " he looks confused pulling at the edge of his t-shirt. For the first time Andrea notices what the man is wearing, a simple dark blue t-shirt with the words "T-Media" and dark jeans rolled up to his ankles, he's barefoot and he wears a single Apple watch on his right hand, which means he's left handed.

"They didn't say anything" she whispers into the roar of the waves, she looks down at the sand.

"It will get better, everyone is on their own timeline" he insists, "broken hearts, or almost broken hearts all heal at their own pace. Some take weeks, months, years but they do heal. All wounds heal, they leave scars but they heal and they leave room for us to be reckless again," he states.

"And if they don't?" Andrea genuinely asks inhaling deeply as they've come to stand under the boardwalk.

"They dull," he pauses running his hand through his hair, "I don't even know your name"

She ponders, and reaches into her purse," Andrea."

"Andrea, I'm Steve," he pauses and looks down at the sand, "do you want to grab a drink?"

"I can't I have to meet my friend in a bit," she answers quicker than she has ever answered anything except maybe when Ronny from divorce law asked if he wanted a second date.

"I understand" he says and extends his hand out to her,

She takes it smiling, "but listen if you're ever in Chicago, we'll grab dinner" as she says it she pulls out a business card and hands it over.

"Criminal Law," he arches an eyebrow "I'm impressed, I may need this someday."

"See you around," she waves at him and walks away from the moment. Bearing her soul to a stranger had been uplifting in a sense. It had reminded her that there are people with bigger problems than her, with irreplaceable loss, at least Miranda was alive, and safe and happy.

The tears she had been holding pour out as she turns of the engine to her rental Jeep. She used to own a jeep during law school. Richard Sachs had insisted she needed a car in Los Angeles even if just for the duration of her schooling days at USC.

"LA isn't like New York Andy he would say shaking his head, no cabs on every corner. " he had been right like everything else. This Jeep was sleeker, and more grown up but still black and it made her smile. The tears seem to not stop, but she knows how to calm them down she's not stranger to tears, they come often. She's been crying for as long as she can remember since her grandmother passed away, and then for Miranda. Sometimes she's wake up at night from a vivid dream, tears pressed against the onyx pillow cover, she's wake up confused and laced with sleep crying. The depth of the loss, of all her losses pressed against her chest, it hurt, physical pain that seemed to reach deep inside everything she was. The pain was hallow, sometimes she'd gasp for air and she could not breathe, sharp jolts of pain stabbing her heart. She never thought it was real, heartbreak, until Olivia Nieto had passed away. Andrea would wake up with a longing she knew would never be filled, and deep desperate sadness that would often linger all day. 'I never thought I'd miss you this much, that it hurt this much,' she'd whisper in the darkness of her room. Then came Miranda and the hurt multiplied. 'I never thought you'd matter so much' she would say half angry at herself for falling in love.

When she was driving and the tears tempted to come down, she' count trees, or red stoplights, or white cars, the trick was to find something repeating, a pattern, a color, something that required little thinking and distracted the mind. It kept her from breaking down at important events, galas, and the freeways.

By the time she had arrived at Pelican Hill in Newport Beach where Natalie now lived she was calm, the soft, velvet notes of Frank Sinatra filled the emptiness of the car and she was ready to change into the dress and join her friend for dinner.

Natalie had insisted she stay at the house with them, it had a pressing ocean view and terrace that lead up to the incessant waves. She had denied in lieu of spending some time alone with a no lesser ocean view. Newport Beach was the Hamptons of New York, full of awe inspiring ocean views and houses to pair. Luxury dripped from the ostentatious beach houses to the sparkling clear blue waves that rocked melancholy over the rocky shores. It was full of five-star restaurant inspired by the waves they stood upon, with large windows to let the calm sea breeze in, and candle lights to make even the most stoic soul fall in love. It was the stuff California brochures are made off, glossy ocean vistas and bright smiling blondes with Prada swimsuits. Andrea though about Miranda, she would love it, how she would fit right in and instantly she shook the thought away. Miranda belonged to her New York life, in the past.

"Andrea! Oh my God, I've missed you so much" Natalie exclaimed jumping up from the white clothed table she was sitting at.

Andrea smiled and laughed at the pressure of her friend's hug. It was nice to see that she was still the same bubbling girl, bursting with words of praise and sunshine. Natalie looked more polished, a large Cartier bangle the only piece of jewelry hanging from her thin wrists, her once blond wavy hair, was light brown and pulled into a low bun and she wore a navy blue dress that ended mid-calf, and a tan cardigan that was strewn over the nearby table.

"You look gorgeous lady! Chicago suits you," Natalie continues before Andrea has had a change to say the same. She laughs, a hearty laugh spilling with sincerity and nostalgia for her days with Natalie.

"you do to," she says. A brief second after they sit and the scattered patrons go back to their own conversations Andrea notices her friend is not wearing her wedding band. Her eyes flicker up to the dark -haired waitress candidly making her way over,

"I'll take a Macallan, neat" she instantly spits out, "I'll have the same" Natalie offer quietly and the waitress wanders off without mentioning her name or what the house specials are.

They wait in semi-silence for a few ticking minutes, glancing over the dark covered menu. Andrea notices the sole in caper-butter sauce, sole always brings her back to Paris. Paris always brings her back to Miranda. She'll get the sole.

The whiskeys arrive and the waitress mumbles something about the chef's special to which both women as if in unison shake their head and order oysters to start. A smile plays along both their faces, friends indeed. After they order their respective entrees Natalie puckers her mouth and says, "I'm getting a divorce."

"Natalie, I do…" Andrea stops herself, she's about to say she doesn't know what to say, she's about to say she's sorry but she can't. Two thoughts play into her mind, first that now her friend is free to marry Charles and then that if her friend can do, then maybe she can find Miranda again.

"You can say it" Natalie states

"what?" Andrea sips on her drink.

"The I told you so, part. Or the I would have told you so."

The brunette lawyer shakes her head, her eyes sparkle like diamonds in the low lights of the restaurant and Natalie stares momentarily as if caught by her friends beauty that she had never seen before. Miranda had to be blind, she thought to herself, to let Andrea go.

"I just wish he had been the one" Andrea answers diplomatically as if she were playing a courtroom jury.

"Now I understand why you win all your cases" Natalie smiles melancholy, "you see we doctors are taught to speak the truth the brutally honest truth. To tell patients they are dying, that they need transplants we can't get, that their insurance does not cover their costly surgery, we have to tell families that their loved one has died or is dying. We don't play cover up, we don't have to wonder is the patient is innocent or if he is a good guy, we just have to tell them the truth. And the truth is Andrea, that I was miserable for a long, long time. I was miserable while I was hiding an affair with Grant, I was miserable every time I had to see Charles and know he was suffering, I was miserable having to lie to my family. I was miserable and you knew it. I know you never spoke up because you didn't want to move the plate, you didn't want me to say it was none of your business, you didn't even try to stop me from marrying Grant. You came and you drank French champagne with me. I don't blame you, in fact I'm not really sure why I'm saying this, I wasn't planning on it. I just wanted to see my best friend. Then you looked at my hand and you still said nothing. This is why you are still pinning for someone who may or may not love you, because you're too afraid to rock the boat" the epilogue had come out tumbling, unwarranted, unexpected, it had come out like most of these things often come out, repressed and raw.

"Oysters?" the waitress interrupted the now two silent women as Andrea tried to close her mouth and Natalie tried to breath steadily.

"We're going to need two more Macallans, "Andrea stated, "a lot more Macallan"

There is a moment that goes by, a beat, a palpable second where all three women feel the tension and then the waitress nods, and walks off. Andrea takes a deep breath and instead of disputing a single word her doctor friend has said nods, "I'm sorry, I should have spoken up."

Natalie nods, casting her glance toward the table and the now empty Macallan glasses that sit between them, she's too sad to cry so she shrugs.

"Well I don't really want to talk about that anymore. Tomorrow yes but for today I want to get drunk, completely wasted, like we did in school and then I want you to stay at my house because I feel lonely"

Andrea laughs and nods, I could not agree more"


	2. Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO ~

By the time Andrea returns home a week later, it is still snowing in Chicago. The snow is less constant and the streets are not a murder scene waiting to happen but it is cold none the less. There is something different in her, as if guilt and age creeped up overnight and changed the person who she was.

A month after she arrived, she stood in the mirror for half an hour, simply staring at herself. The 29 year old self that blinked back unapologetic. She had two strands of silver hair, hiding on the left side of her part, and there was wrinkles vaguely showing around her large oval eyes. Her skin looked different than it had years ago, and she was sure she'd need a Photoshop filter to make it look the same. Yet, more than what the mirror could constitute she felt different, what was it all leading to? What was that existential question humans lived for? She had never been the philosophical type, never argued about the obscurity of human life, about religion or faith but today, here, alone she wondered about it. She wondered about her parents deep, unwavering, almost visible belief in God, the Catholic version that looked down benevolently from church altars and yet punished with such wrath. She wondered about religions unmovable view points, and she fought hard with herself. Her best friend's marriage crumbling from the foundations made her wonder about the sanctity of marriage. She closes her eyes and let the fog of the bath she took embrace the mirror. If she's honest she has to admit that is part of why she ran away from Miranda. Why she didn't stay in Paris or New York, why she didn't wait for reply or try again. She wanted to justify herself, say that the ball was on Miranda's' court and laugh at the impossibility of Miranda even remembering her name, but the truth is that she had ran away for her own internal battle. Tears of rage and impotence ran slowly down soft tan cheeks.

"Miranda?" Andrea asks startled as she opens her door dressed and ready to leave for the office. She has a metallic coffee tumbler in one hand with the law firm's name monogramed on the side, a cashmere coat hangs on her left hand and she's wearing a tailored black Valentino suit with a steel grey blouse and matching diamond earrings.

"It's good to see you learned some style" Miranda quips her hand caught mid -air as she was about to ring the doorbell. If this had been part of a movie it certainly would have made it into the preview.

Andrea takes a deep breath, she tries to say something to herself, something to calm the mess that has tumbled inside of her, but she can't come with a single word.

"What… what are you doing here?" she finally asks digging her mind out of the fog.

"is that how you win all your cases?" Miranda asks not really planning on being sarcastic, but being nonetheless because she always resorts to that when words fail her, when she's nervous, and regretting that she came.

Andrea deadpans, looking at her former boss as if she were a rare insect on a wall. The look of shock still can't wipe itself of her face. She's beyond confused, and then she inevitably her eyes rake the older woman up and down. She's wearing a long, tight black dress and an oversized camel colored coat, with a faux fur trim and matching gloves. She stops breathing, for a second time stops with her, if someone asked her she would swear the Chanel watch on her wrist had stopped with it.

"I came to apologize, Andrea" Miranda drawls out after the silence and after feeling the stare from her young ex-assistant dressed in a power suit in front of her.

The brunette gulps, and rests a hand on the frame of her door.

"You? Apologize?"

Miranda nods, 'may I come in?"

Andrea doesn't nod, she doesn't agree, she simply stands aside and lets the older woman in. Her perfume swifts by, bergamot and lilies. When she first started working for the Devil in Prada she would have pegged her for a dark wood notes and juniper kind of woman, a sexy, strong perfume, dominatrix to match her media persona. She was wrong, as she had been with a lot of things with the editor. She was a classic Chanel kind of woman, classic Chanel, classic heartbreak.

"I… hold on I need to call the office" Andrea states setting her coffee cup down and throwing her coat on the table, Miranda can't help but catch the mannerism and smile. She takes in the loft, simple but classic. A few abstract paintings, a large window view into the city and a striking centerpiece glass table. She nods, above the fireplace a few pictures, Andrea with a blonde woman about the same age, Andrea in a graduate attire, then with a few colleagues and an embossed corner name, a young Andrea with her parent's and finally Andrea at Runway in a paparazzi shot that Miranda had never seen, she's smiling a little behind Miranda with a fashion house behind them. Miranda was completely nervous about coming, she didn't like defeat or refusals and on the flight here she had been pretty sure she was walking into both. Now seeing the picture she felt a glimmer of hope.

"What are you doing here?" the young brunette repeats after a conversation on asking for continuance and being there a few hours late.

"I already told you Andrea I wanted to apologize"

"I heard you, but I'm not sure for what?"

"For everything I suppose," Miranda gulps and waves he hand 'for Paris, for pushing you away, for never responding to your letter, for not coming after you, for making you suffer."

Andrea can hear her heart beat faster, she can feel the pulse on her wrist, she doesn't want to cry so she turns around and pours a glass of wine from a nearby decanter.

"Apology accepted, Miranda. That was a long time ago. Now tell me what you really want. The queen of fashion does not simply fly out from New York to apologize to an ex-assistant." Andrea has gained some composure and she turns around.

"but you're no longer an ex-assistant. I just want one single answer An-dre-a" the silver haired woman asks, "does your letter still stand?"

"what?"

"Your letter, the one you sent me? Does it still stand?"

"What does it matter? Miranda, it has been six years, six fucking years! I have made a life apart from you, from runway, from Paris. I don't understand what you want? I … you never cared before?"

The editor stands up from the stool she had sat on by the kitchenette, she paces slowly by the large window, the skyscrapers are tall but not as tall as New York. She arches her back, and stands tall, "I went to look for you a day after the flowers, but you were… um.. gone" she says flatly as if it was one more thing to do.

It reminds Andrea of Paris, of the hotel suite, of vulnerable Miranda. She knows Miranda is trying, she knows this has to be one of the hardest conversations she's ever had.

"I didn't' know what to do. I looked for you months later. I tried to no… um" pause… "it wasn't hard to find your family, turns out the legacy daughter of a notable Chicago DOJ Attorney is new to post at USC's website. I almost went, but I could not bear to disrupt your life. I was hoping you would find someone to marry, to have a family with. I was hoping."

"That I haven't married still does nothing to satiate my curiosity as to why you are here."

"I framed all the flowers from that day, they are dried in my office, " Miranda whispers back still turned toward the Chicago lawyer.

"I saw him last night" Miranda states and Andrea winces.

"Do you love him?"

The younger woman laughs, the irony breaks her concentration. Of course, Miranda would pick the one night in the last few years where she has slept with someone. Steve, the man from California had shown up at her office two days ago.

~ two days ago~

"Andrea Sachs," he said throwing out a whistle of admiration as he danced into her office, "wow you didn't tell me you worked for the big leagues."

"Steve, what are you doing here?" she asks

"I was in town, you once offered me drinks."

"Wow, yeah … I didn't think you'd ever come" she said showing her surprise

"So that is a no?"

She paused, "you know what I'm feeling adventurous, and I am done with work. I know this great jazz bar."

They walk out as he tells her that he really was here on business, "I work for the LA tourism board, we come to different conventions to gain traction and get companies to go out to Los Angeles"

He was wearing a formal navy blue suit, unbuttoned with a silver grey shirt. He looked older than he did at the beach, his scraggy beard had been shaved off and his ocean blue eyes, looked grey and dark. It had to be Chicago, the cold did that to everyone.

"What do you do again?" she asked as she pulled her car out of the garage.

"I am in Public Relations" he states

"PR" she repeats more to herself than anyone else.

The sun is setting in the grey sky, the night is coming soon like a mantle of shine less stars and absolution. The jazz bar is filled with smoke and the smell of alcohol. They take a seat and order two sidecars, she gets a distinct feeling that he is a beer kind of man, but ignores it anyway. He asks about her stay in California, she tells him about Natalie's divorce.

"Are you a jazz fan?" Andrea asks as the very known "Shadow of your smile" starts to play in brassy tones and low beats.

He shakes his head, "not really"

Andrea arches an eyebrow, "oh, why did you let me bring you to a jazz bar?" she asks

"I didn't want to object" he says and tries to grab her hand

"I still feel the same as I felt on that beach" she confesses, tilting back whatever was left of their third cocktail.

"Oh" he muses, "but you are never going to make a move for it."

"Perhaps not, but I still love her" she says somewhat weekly and after a second of perplexed confusion, he almost pegs it.

"Oh, so she's married" he flatly states.

Andrea shakes her head, "no"

"I think I should drive you back to your hotel" she says

"I don't' think you should drive" he says and perhaps he is right, but they still do. They pull the navy blue, sleek Mercedez out of the restaurants parking lot and speed through Chicago.

"You're not going to offer me a nightcap?" Steve insists.

If Andrea wasn't so infatuated, she could love him. She pulls up at her building, hands the keys to the doorman and stumbles slightly into the elevator. It's gilded, with somber shades of gold and traces of an old Chicago that does not exists anymore.

~ present~

"I fucked him" she confesses unapologetically.

"I see" Miranda schools her features and Andrea can see the blue -eyed editor clench her jaw.

"Just answer my previous question, Andrea. Do you still feel the same as you did in that letter? Do you still love me? "

Andrea does not answer, she sips the Riddell stem glass in her hands, savoring the moment. How many times had she thought of what to say if Miranda ever asked? She had played this imaginary conversation in her mind a million times. The real moment was different, full of doubt and expectation. What happened if she said yes? The air stilled. She feels Miranda's fingertips flutter by her face, the smell of Chanel and new clothes. Her fingers lightly caress her cheek, pulling a loose strand of brown hair, she inhales sharply and lifts her eyes to the editors.

Miranda is watching her expectantly. How did she get so close? How had she walked from the window, across the room so fast?

"Yes," she breaths so softly it is almost inaudible.

"yes, you know I do. I always will" she confesses and before she could process the exact consequences of the monumental confession she has just made she feels the soft pressure of perfectly painted lips against hers. She feels them close in around her bottom lip, she moves with them, as if they had been made one for the other. This is what it is supposed to feel like, it's supposed to be easy and perfect, it is supposed to take your breath away. She's not going to make it into the office. Miranda's hands roam her waist and then they break for air.

The older editor smiles and waits expectantly again on Andrea.

"Do you?" the young woman asks pressing her cheek against her shorter companion.

She feels a nod against her head, "I am not in the habit of seeking people I don't love across the country"

Andrea chuckles, she's about to question what comes next when she feels Miranda pull at her shirt, then she feels the somewhat cold hands on her bare back and she closes her eyes. A warmth between her legs pools and she pushes the editor against the kitchen counter.

"Mmmm" someone moans and it's not clear who.

She hasn't felt this need, this want this desire in a long time. Not with Steve, not with anyone. And the truth is there has been no one. A few dates here and there, forced by her friends and always with the backdrop of Miranda.

"I love you Andrea," the fashion tycoon whispers slowly as she puts her leg in between Andreas core.

Andrea unzips the black Fendi dress her now lover is wearing, underneath is a large expase of milky white skin, and black lingere.

"Not here Andrea" she hears Miranda say. At his point the older woman is standing only in her lingerie set and Andrea hair ruffled but still in pants and an untucked blouse pulls the Miranda toward the bedroom.

A slow play followed, the silver haired woman peeled the remaining clothes of her young lover slowly, aided by the shadows that the corner light created. It was as if all the repressed words of the past six years came pouring out in fingertips trailing over smooth skin, and lips exploring crevices, as if hands treading in long luminous locks and hands ruffling short silky ones spoke the words both women kept concealed. Miranda sat on top of Andrea legs intertwined, biting her lower lip, rocking the woman below her, neither had ever done it, but it wasn't awkward.

"Oh yes, fuck yes… " Andrea mouthed as her body swayed to the Miranda's rhythm. The brunette's hands rested on the editors hips, "Miranda yes" she would say louder and faster as she neared her falling point. They had been making love all afternoon. The candor in their hearts would transcribe into hard, desperate, longing sex where they rushed to the finish. Miranda taking control and pulsing her manicured fingers inside an anxious Andrea. Then their first and primitive need satiated they had tried it again, this time slow and soft. Their hands trailing along the curves of each other's body, stopping for a kiss and an affirmation of love. As if a melancholy classical masterpiece played in the back of their mind, Puccini in a masterful opera that swelled as the screen captivated the love. Eventually they would simply lounge in the king bed, Andrea resting her head against the older woman's heart, hearing her palpitations as if she was dreaming. Her left leg thrown over Miranda and her hand encircling her lover's waist. They would sit in silence the darkness of the enclosed room bathing them in wonder. For those long expanses of time, it was as if they were both one. Andrea ended at the edge of her fingertips, the tips of her hair and Miranda continued. They had always been one, from the moment Andrea anticipated Miranda's words, needs, coffee orders to the moment Miranda felt alone and lost in Paris.

Then one of their hands would linger south again and they would find each other on top, or sideways making passionate love again.

When the evening fell and the blackout curtains were no longer necessary, the soft moonlight bathed the room. They sat on opposite couches, wrapped in bathrobes and sipping wine.

"I'm sorry I made you miss work" Miranda spoke.

Andrea chuckled, snorting as she put her wine down.

"It's a dread full case anyway" she said

"Either way"

"It was worth it, I doubt the courtroom would have been so satisfying" Andrea hinted and Miranda shook her head smiling.

When the dawn broke, Andrea woke from her slight dozing to find that Miranda was dressed and sipping coffee in the kitchen.

"Miranda, you should have woken me up"

"You looked tired" she winked.

"I … I was. Listen I have to work today" she said looking almost ashamed.

"I understand," Miranda put the cup she was drinking down and stood up. Looking regal even with no makeup.

"Andrea, I don't know that you understand what this means to me. I love you. I want everything with you. I am willing to make whatever adjustments I have to, to keep you in my life."

The blood drains from Andrea's face. She had expected this. Miranda never did anything halfway, the fact that she had flown here, and put herself in a position of possible rejection meant that she had thought about this a lot.

"I will fly out here every weekend, I will do anything. I want to go public, I want to everything."

She stops and notices the younger woman's silence.

"I don't know if you realize that" she says. All their future hangs on what Andrea answers to that.

"I want to marry you Andrea, do you not see that? "

Andrea nods, putting her hands in the padded pockets of her bathrobe.

"I see it Miranda" her answer is almost sad.

"But" the editor knows something she does not want to hear is coming.

"I can't" Andrea whispers.

"I see" the editor again schools her features, but she doesn't move. She doesn't sit down, or walk toward the window. She simply stands there looking at her purse across the room. A white Prada purse, similar to the one she had worn when she first met Andrea years ago.

"So… what you said yesterday?"

"It's true, Miranda, I love you. I do, I always have but I can't … my family. They would not approve."

The editor tilts her head backwards, and inhales sharply.

"I don't understand. You started all this. You sent that letter. If I had flown to the west coast, if I had told you I loved you in Paris? Would it have been different? Would they have accepted it then? Would you?"

Andrea knows her former boss is trying to not cry. She knows the best is to be honest.

"yes."

"how? How Andrea because I don't fucking understand? Was it just revenge?"

"No, not at all" she walks toward Miranda, she wants to kiss her but the older woman takes a step back and toward the door.

"I can't now. Jesus Miranda it has been so long. You can't expect people to drop their life, because you have decided to come apologize. I have a career, and my mother had a heart attack. Telling them would kill her, I can't Miranda."

The blue - eyed woman's face falls, she no longer looks mad. "I see"

"No! I don't think you do. I love you. As I'm sure you loved me all those years, yet you decided to not let me know. Seven years Miranda! I'm not questioning your reasons"

"So now it's my fault?"

"I really have to get ready for work, why don't you go to your hotel and meet me for dinner. I want to explain"

Miranda shakes her head, "No, don't worry Andrea it's not a big deal. Look at it as your lucky week. You fucked some man, you fucked some woman. It has been a good week for you, now you just need to win a case" she grabs her coat and puts her hands on the doorknob.

"No, it's not like that and you know it"

"That's all" Miranda whispers her signature phrase as she walks out the door.

"Miranda wait!" Andrea yells after her and stops as her down the hall neighbor walks out with her dog and looks at her strangely. She remembers she's still in a robe and barefooted, and that she has depositions in two hours. She walks back into her loft, the door thuds behind her. This is for the best. It has to be.

A few days later as she comes home from work, a package sits outside her door. She scrunches her nose, nothing that she has ordered recently. The young lawyer looks at her watch, out of habit, 9:30. She wonders what could be, it looks like a frame. She takes it in her hands, trying to juggle the frame, her coat and her laptop bag.

Upon closer inspection, she realizes the stamp is from New York, her heart sinks, suddenly she knows exactly what it is. She unwraps it slowly to reveal a beautiful onyx metal frame, expertly placed 24 white roses, dried, and panning against a black background. A note is tucked to the back, a single folded, monogramed piece of paper.

"I was going to throw it out, but I could not bring myself to destroy it. I hope you like it.

M"

Andrea stares dumfound and the note, she read it and read it a few times.

The phone rings, startling Andrea from her concentration on the cursive letters splashes across an off- pearl piece of paper.

Andrea throws her head back, and grunts exasperated.

It's Natalie, "Andrea I just got your message. I'm so sorry, you should have called again!"

Andrea shrugs as if her friend was seeing her.

"What happened?"

"Well, the one thing I never expected to happen"

"She appeared in your life, years later and wants what? For you to drop everything down? It's her fault Andrea, don't beat yourself over it"

"remember what we said about honesty" Andrea whispers over the phone

"Yes, if the only thing keeping you apart from her is your family then you're a fool to let her go…. But if it is also your own conscience however confused and misguided it may be then don't. "

"Nat…"

"Andrea" her demure friend cuts her off, "if you are not sure you will be miserable and you will make her miserable even if you love her"

"I … she seemed so hurt"  
"Did you not learn from Grant and I? Even if, she loves you if you both are not sure then it's not going to work"

"She's sure" Andrea argues

"That's why it took her six years to find you? And that's why she runs at the first obstacle? I don't think so Andrea"

"I don't want to talk about this" she says plainly "I'm going to take a shower"

"I'm coming over," Natalie states

"No, you don't' need to. I don't need a babysitter Natalie."

Natalie sighs and whispers "but maybe I need you"

'Okay let's do a compromise, I have to go to New York next month for a few weeks, come with me. It will be a good getaway for both of us."

Natalie agrees.

Andrea hangs up the phone and sighs, she loves New York. She misses the crowded streets, the neon lights, the feeling of exhilaration that comes from simply existing there. The beacon of freedom for so many, for so long. The beacon of fame for others, for stories and companies and dreams to be made. Yet, she also hated New York the high crime rate, the poverty levels, the projects the asphyxiation that people must feel being there. Seeing the highs rises and the jewelry stores in Upper East Side Manhattan and knowing that you're never going to be able to afford them. A knock at the door draws her out of her daze.

"Miranda" Andrea sighs breathlessly as she's not getting used to stand at her doorframe and either be surprised by her former boss or yell at her. She's also beginning to wonder if the overpriced tag of this apartment because of security is banal since Miranda has come up without warning twice.

"I made it home and then I realized I wasn't being fair. I didn't give you time, to explain, to think to breathe so I thought I'd take you up on dinner" she pauses criticizing Andrea's reaction for a minute, slowly dragging her gaze from the black nail polish on her young lovers toes, to mid-calf black banana republic pencil skirt that flowed into a burnt orange blouse, now untucked and a gold statement necklaces that matches the weaved gold Chanel bangle on Andreas right arm and finally up to the large brown eyes that fixed their gaze on Miranda.

"If you still want to" Miranda adds somewhat tentatively.

Andrea lets go a breath she was holding and nods. "I don't know where we can go, it's Friday night"

Miranda smiles, "have you ever known me not to be prepared?"

Andrea shakes her head, "I'll grab my coat and keys."

"I'll drive" Miranda argues to which Andrea does not reply. She walks away from the door, hears it click behind her and then she feels the rampart heart beat from her chest, her heart is trying to escape before it gets broken again. Steve had been wrong, it would never heal.

She tucks her shirt in, grabs the black matching coat and her Birkin crocodile purse and rushes to not make the older lady wait.

Miranda is leaning against the opposite wall, right leg in front of the left, white heel resting sideways on the wooded floor, her black palazzo trails almost to the floor and the white and grey cape coat that accompanies her overlaps as her left arm hugs her stomach and her right one rests on top of it, cradling her face. She's smiling as she sees Andrea come out and reaches out to hold her by the elbow, "come I have reservation at my favorite restaurant here"

"You driving in Chicago, I never thought I'd live to see the day," Andrea pauses blinking as she steps into the grey car "in fact there are many things I thought I'd never live to see".

Miranda turns around to look at her in a mock curious glance and then as they pull away laughs slightly, "Like the most influential editor in fashion coming to beg for dinner twice?" she asks and though for a second it seems like a reproach, it is not. It is meant to be soft and gentle and disconsolate.

Andrea feels the sting of guilt in her soul. She stops to breath for a second and then turns to see her silver haired companion, concentrating on the night road.

"Miranda, I do love you," she lets the words fall simultaneously one after the other, she feels them hang in the edge of the car. They are meant to be a consolation, though after she says them she's not sure who they are for.

"I know" she hears the answer back

"I always will" her hand reaches out to the editor's thigh and though neither mentions it, she hears the editor sigh.

"I hope you liked the frame" Miranda speaks as they sit down at the dimly lit, rarely heard of restaurant.

"I did, it's beautiful. Leave it to you to make a masterpiece out of dying flowers" Andrea jokes

Miranda smiles, fluffing her napkin onto her lap and sais "if only I could make a masterpiece out of dying love"

"You can't because it's not dying"

"May I get you something to drink, ladies? "

"I'll have…" Andrea is about to order whiskey, neat like she always does but Miranda reaches across the table and places her hand ever so gentle over her own, and turns to look at the waiter, "We will have the house specialty," she turns to Andrea and sais "I think you'll like it darling"

Andrea nods and the waiter walks off.

"Miranda, I don't like people to order for me" she says as softly as she can.

"I'm not people, Andrea" Miranda answers playing with the thin silver chains falling down her chest, "besides if this is going to be our first and last dinner ever then what is the point of me playing nice?"

Moments of silence pass, the waitress comes back with two identical glasses, cut crystal and blood orange garnish. Andrea doubts, then she sips it. She closes her eyes and relishes in the soft notes of cardamom, and orange that peak out slightly against the hard flavor of bourbon and smoke.

"Did I choose correctly, Andrea?" Miranda asks knowing the answer will be yes. Instead than playing into her game Andrea chooses to answer with something different.

"This won't be the last dinner we have Miranda, you know it, I know it, we're meant for something even if it isn't each other"

"That is an elegant way of telling me you still hold the same opinion as last time?" Miranda questioned.

Andrea sighed, taking another sip of the orange elixir sitting in front of her. She gulped it down slowly buying herself time to answer the dominant woman sitting across her.

"Take your time answering, you know how that thrills me" Miranda deadpans and though she doesn't smile, Andrea knows her enough to know she's joking.

She shakes her head, "no"

"No?" The two lettered word hangs in the abyss of their dinner. "Which one is it? No you don't have the same opinion? Or no we're not meant for each other?"

Andrea can say anything, she can still escape the complicated situation, she can finish her dinner amicably with the fashion icon, and then go home to her comfortable flat, to her partner track, to her traditionalist family, and be happy.

"I don't have the same view," there is a time pass, it is now Miranda's turn to sip her drink. She does not want to interrupt whatever the younger brunette is about to say. Miranda is not used to being in a vulnerable position, she's not used to letting her guard down, to bearing her heart, to getting hurt. It makes her incredibly uncomfortable, the things she's capable of doing for Andrea, for a second assistant that abandoned her in Paris, for this young brazen woman who she hasn't seen in years.

"I want to be with you. I want you. I … just can't marry you…. Not yet. I want to get to know you first, this you," she pauses as if expecting Miranda to interrupt, she doesn't. "I want to know what you like to watch on TV, and what you eat for breakfast, and I want to know what you wear to bed, and what literature you like. I want to know everything about you Miranda, and I want you to know me" she inhales.

'I do know you Andrea," the editor finally speaks, voice calm and collected because she is not sure what direction this conversation is going in and the lack of control frustrates her.

"I know you're a wonderful, talented woman. I know you prefer dark chocolate over any other candy, I know before Nate you almost married your high school sweetheart, Henry Mills the son of the then Mayor of Boston, Regina, who lost her senate seat to Elizabeth Warren. I know that you are a middle child but Rich your baby brother passed away at four. I know you were a Biology Major and wanted to be a great doctor but changed to journalism after taking one single class freshman year. I know you like anything with carbs"

Andrea snorts

"I know you love me… "brown eyes meet diamond blue ones, "I'm I wrong?"

Again, Andrea shakes her head. "How do you even know all this?"

Miranda smirks, "You weren't the only one paying attention"

Andrea smiles a blush creeping from the warmth of the concealed compliment.

"Stay with me Miranda, stay some time. Here in Chicago"

Miranda looks down to the perfect asparagus that lay perpendicular on her white plate, she poises her knife and fork ready to cut the sirloin which they accompany.

"Okay" she whispers after a few minutes of silence in which the young lawyer has proceeded to finish the mound of mash potatoes and mushroom gravy that adorned her lamb plate.

"Okay? You'll stay?" she smiles. It is enough to make Miranda know that staying is the right decision, it fill her thoughts with nerves and her whole being with a certain knowledge and happiness she only feels with the younger woman.

She nods.

Andrea doesn't say another word, she simply reaches out to hold the hand that is still strewn across the table.

They both lay awake that night, side by side as innocent as two teenagers at a sleepover.

The muted sounds of mob city surround the quiet high rise and the shadows cast by the sliver of light that enters the bedroom provide a pattern of concentration for both women.

Miranda rests her head upon Andrea's shoulders, and almost toward the sunrise sleep forces their eyes closed.

The days breeze by, wistful, wrapping themselves around the two women like ocean spray onto rocks, silently and gently. This time around the universe conspires, sunlit days and winter nights to give two damaged souls a respite. Perhaps it was a gift, an offering that the world was giving them. If you asked Miranda she would have said the days were wonderful because they had been worth the wait, because there was an anticipation of something, because they had been through so much, their hearts were mended and fragile and those days in a bubble of their making were wonderful. If you asked Andrea, the eloquent lawyer who trader words on paper for words on the stand, she would say they were beautiful in their own right like winters in Maine, frozen oceans that splashes shallow waves and grey mornings watching the rain in Paris. She would say they were beautiful like delicate pastries wrapped in teal parchment and dimming Christmas lights but above all they were beautiful because she spent them with Miranda.

"can I tell you something?" Andrea asks one night confession weaved into the bliss of the few days spent together. They're sitting in Andrea's sofa the room is completely dark save for the faint lights of the city below. Miranda is resting her weight against Andrea's middle, while Andrea leans into the corner of the couch, her hands gently trail Miranda's shoulders and arms. She does it very lightly, almost as if her fingers fluttered above the porcelain complexion of her older lover's skin.

"mmmhhh" Miranda hums closing her eyes.

"You can't laugh" Andrea cautions

"Or else?" the queen of fashion asks and even though her eyes are closes and the room is dark you can imagine seeing her glare.

"Miranda!"

"Andrea just tell me" she pauses, "if you killed someone I am sure we can figure out how to hide the body" she jokes and laughs lightly at he own joke.

"That first day, when I met you I had this feeling that I had met you before" Andreas whispers ignoring the joke

Miranda doesn't speak.

"I knew you, I wanted to sit down and talk, catch up. It as the most bizarre feeling"

"You probably remember paging through a magazine and seeing me, but not enough obviously since you had the hideous blazer on."

"Hey! Be nice"

"How did you change so much Andrea? How are you this fashionable siren now?" Miranda asks

"Miranda this is serious, it is a confession I have never made to anyone. I don't think I even wanted to admit it to myself. True love, soul mates that is just phrases invented by the media. But, you… I wanted to hold you and say I had missed you"

Miranda turns around putting some distance between them, their bodies are still touching only now they are facing each other. The silver haired legend purses her lips and then smiles pulling Andrea's thin hand toward her lips and blowing a kiss.

"I know Andrea. If we are doing confessions, I felt it too. I wanted to run up to you and say, 'hey there you are'. After you left it was as if I had missed something. I called it hope, hope that you would turn out to be amazing," she stops herself Andrea breathes in time stills.

"And you did… you turned out to be both amazing and disappointing … when you left. "

Andrea hangs on to her every word, even though her former boss has been living with her for almost a week now, even though it was Miranda who flew out to seek her, it was hard to get her to say what she felt, hard to get her to explain why all this was worth it, hard to get her to speak about Andrea's time at Runway and the years that transcribed in between then and now.

So, this narrating Miranda, this soft-spoken story teller was new. Andrea wanted her to speak forever, she would be content to let the hours melt away, let time pass indefinitely as long as her lover was holding her hand and purring words into the night. Miranda doesn't catch the admiration in Andreas dark chestnut eyes, she doesn't catch the slightly parted lips and the lack of blinking, the adoration, the god like idolatry that fills the room and spill from Andrea. She never did, she was for all her attention to detail oblivious when it came to herself.

"I had denied it until then. Chucked it to the way you changed, I had filed that flutter I felt when I saw you to pride that you had learned about fashion, that you had adapted, then I told myself it was admiration at the way you did your job…I remember going to sleep at night and thinking of you," she paused to push her silver locks out of the way. 'It would perturb me that I thought of you at night, and I would tell myself that it was because you were competent, that maybe one day you'd be interested enough, and good enough to be me."

Andrea wants to ask her a multitude of questions, she wants to ask her if she thought of her in every way possible, if as Neruda once said she loved her as dark things are meant to be loved. She wants to ask her everything, but she stays quiet because she's afraid to break the spell. She's afraid that if she speaks Miranda will realize that she's vulnerable, that she's talking about them and stop. That whatever magic spell has been cast will fall.

"I guess I saw myself in you, I still do. More than that however I used all those excuses to deny that I felt an attraction, a love for you. I did it until Paris, until you left. I realized I missed you, more than I had ever missed an assistant, I missed not the way you knew my appointments, my likes and dislikes, not the way you always got my coffee on time or did the impossible tasks. I missed your smile, your eyes looking expectantly at me, your quirky comments, your random candy wrappers I found, I missed your voice and …. I didn't know what to do. I had to be crazy. I could not be in love with you…. A beautiful girl 24 years younger. It was madness and … surely I was alone in the depth of my feelings"

Something in the distance hums and ticks, household artifacts aching away. Andrea twitches, Miranda sighs and wipes the back of her hand on her cheek. For the first time Andrea notices that tears stream down porcelain skin, she doesn't remember seeing Miranda cry, except in the Paris suite. She wants to kiss away the clear pearls that stain her lover's cheeks but she doesn't.

Miranda continues the unrehearsed speech.

"Then you wrote that note and the only validation I needed was granted"

"So … what detained you?" Andrea finally asks

"Fear …" she sais and leans in to kiss the brunette

"Of what?"

"That it was just infatuation, girl crush, power admiration … I have seen it all. I was afraid that you would find someone new after having the 'impossible'," she air-quotes in the darkness, "I didn't think I would be enough, the real me, without the lights and the glamour, without the power suits and people admiring me. I was afraid that the Miranda that existed once the doors closed, the one that lounges in soft loose cardigans, and reads books before bed, the one that likes to sit hours on end holding your hand, the one that would rather stay in and cook than go to one more gala, one more party, that she would not be enough "

"What changed your mind?" Andrea asks moving so that her back is flat on the couch and her head rests over the editor's thighs.

"Fear," she laughs, "of missing my chance completely. I figured if you really did love me after all this time, then maybe just maybe I stood a chance"

Andrea laughs, and pulls the editor down for another subtle kiss, "Miranda you never just stood a chance, you were always the one. All you had do was speak."

There is a long silence. Andrea is procession everything Miranda has said, all that time Andrea spent trying to tell herself she loved Nate, was the time Miranda tried to convince herself that she did not love Andrea. Suddenly she gets up and faces her lover again, "I have something to tell you" she pauses.

Miranda nods, but does not speak.

"I am going to New York for a few weeks next month"

Miranda arches an eyebrow, waiting for Andrea to elaborate.

"I… Diane wants to open in New York instead of LA, and I'm going to set up shop so to speak,"

Miranda blinks a few times and then gets up without warning to refresh their glasses of wine. Walking away has always been Miranda's way to prelude she's about to say something important. Andrea knows this, "Miranda?" she questions into the semi – lit darkness.

"Do you want red again?" she retorts.

"Red is fine, is everything okay?"

"Yes" she answers as she settles back on the couch away from Andrea, leaning against the opposite corner.

"I though you would be more enthusiastic, we get to spend a month in the same state" Andrea reproaches sipping her new glass of California Merlot. There was no immediate answer from her counterpart, instead the silence tasted of berries, earth and jam.

"I don't know why or what happens next Andrea, these few day have been grandiose, unforgettable, a romantized version of life but it's not realit ,darling, " her voice peaks at the last word indicating aggravation.

"What comes the day after tomorrow when I leave? Hmmm?" her ocean blue eyes look directly at Andrea, "Do we send each other anonymous flowers and cards? You hadn't told me about New York for a reason, and I am still not sure why you asked me to stay. Why will Manhattan be different? Our secret affair remains the same, exactly what I didn't want all those years. What happens now Andrea?"

This time Miranda pronounces her lover's name, like she always does, slow and long and purring at the syllables. Andrea crawls over to her older lover, putting her now empty glass of wine on the nearby floor. She squeezes into the side with her and rests her brown locks upon Miranda's soft sweater.

"I don't know Miranda, I don't have all the answers. I wish I did. I know it's a lot to ask, patience from the woman who can have anything and anyone. I know the mere fact that you deigned to come for me, to love me, to know I existed was asking a lot, getting a lot. Miranda, I only know I love you. Knowing you has been the cornerstone of everything I am today, you changed my life in every imaginable way and I can't let you go. I want to spend every possible moment in New York with you. Please humor me."

Miranda sighs melting into the pleading tone from the younger woman holding her hands.

"I want to my darling, I want to humor you but I don't know how to live without you now that I have you" she frees her left hand and cups Andrea's face, a tender touch marred by a cloud of sadness and doubt. The freedom of the past few days, the playfulness, the idealism starts to break away, separating like vinegar and water and both women feel their hearts tear again.

"I am not as brave as you Miranda," the lawyer finally admits closing her eyes at the tender hand cupping her cheeks," I never was. "

"Is that why you ran away?" Miranda asks softly almost like a mother would ask her crying child. Andrea nods and tears fall.

"Please don't end this"

"all right Andrea, I'll let you break my heart" she sighs and presses a soft kiss on the check she had been caressing.

"Tell you what," she continues fly out next weekend, "Well to go to the Hamptons and then the following month life will tell us what we do from here"

Andrea nods, a certain relief comes from hearing the editor say that she's going to let fate decide. She feels an uneasy calm, sort of like when the wind stops and the ocean settles but the natives know a storm is about to come; yet it's calm nonetheless and both women take what they can.

"I won't break your heart" she whispers into the night.


	3. Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

She refused to accept that Miranda send a driver, she took a cab from JFK to the Plaza. She arrived a day earlier anyway, wanting a moment to herself to soak up New York again.

For a moment after she left the posh hotel that afternoon for a stroll down Central Park, in jeans and a corduroy pea coat she almost felt like the old Andy. The idealist journalist who wanted nothing to do with the family business, who ran away from Chicago after her almost husband cheated on her with his mother's secretary. Regina had tried to cover up the slip, had said that 'little Henry had a moment of self-discovery that it would never happen again'. She was good at cover ups, covering up corruption, covering up statistics of crime, poverty and low education during her years as governor. She was good enough that she got a cabinet post last year with the new President, though the president's track record with cabinet resignations and firings it was a tricky deal. Andrea shook her head, she had forgotten how beautiful the water looks from the bridge at the Park. The summer has made the trees all green and full of foliage, their green color rivals the city's grey scheme and make them surreal. Her thoughts drift to the presidency again, it has been a surreal year, an unexpected election,at least from her liberal big city view, it was as if she were living a sci-fic novel, Fahrenheit 84 and Gattica where the end of reality and freedom was eminent, young Andrea would have basked in the realm of stories that could be written, she would have pleaded to be front and center, raised her hand for every possible assignment, not now. Seven years spent between legacy schools and biased courtrooms had jaded her. Democracy was an impossibility, a fairytale, beautiful to imagine but a fallacy to conceive. She kept walking from Central park down to a random subway stop, she paid her ticket and climbed aboard. She hadn't planned it but she ended up on the other side of town, where she used to live with Nate. She walked without a plan, past the Chinese restaurant they used order take-out from, and the first job he had out of culinary school. Had she really loved him? What was it that had ended their relationship? Why had it even started in the first place? He was the antithesis of everything her family wanted, unknown, poor, and a dreamer.

"Andy?" unplanned and without notice she had ended up at her friends Lili's house.

"Hi" she waved slightly.

"My, it's been ages. You disappeared, dropped out of the map, how have you been?" her dark skin friend asks.

Andrea takes a second to answer, this used to be her best friend, they used to know everything about each other. She looks her up and down, she notices Lili shift in her shoes. She's wearing black flats and dark jeans, and a long loose sweatshirt comes down almost to her thighs and her hair is still in unruly curls.

"I've been good. I was just in the neighborhood" she answers.

"Don't you live in LA or something?" Lili asks in reproach.

"Chicago," Andrea casts her eyes downward and looks at her own flat Prada pumps. Lili darts her eyes at them too.

"Well" Lili starts "that's definitely not LA"

Andrea manages a soft chuckle, "no, not at all. Do you still do gallery work?"

Lili nods, they are standing at the corner of the street, she nods toward her condominium, "do you want some tea?"

Andrea doesn't know what to answer, does she? Does she have anything in common with her anymore? The Andrea she knew was called Andy, she had no idea what Prada was, and ate French fries for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The Andrea she knew hadn't helped criminals escape jail, she would never stand for that, she didn't sell out to big companies, she had never heard of Miranda Priestly. This Andrea is hopelessly in love with her, with Ms. Priestly as the New York times calls her, the most influential editor in fashion. And said editor lover her back

The Andrea she was would never wear $500 dollar shoes in the dirty streets of New York, as if on cue her phone vibrates, it's a text from Miranda.

She shakes her head, "I can't I have dinner plans on the other side of town."

Lili nods, "Of course, have fun".

Andrea turns around and walks down a few steps, dialing her lover back, "Miranda, darling I didn't have time to call you this morning. I'm here in New York. I just got your text call me back"

She hadn't noticed Lili had followed suit, when she hangs up she turns to a half smile and a tap.

Her old friend had heard the conversation, "come back soon, okay?"

"Lili, I'm not who I used to be" she explains in hopes that her friend understands the old Andy was lost, still wandering in the city somewhere.

"I see," she says and squares her jaw just like Miranda does. Andrea was never good at doing that, "but you'll still always be my friend. Remember that"

She leans in for a hug, awkward at first and then comforting, a few seconds of herself came back.

By the time she had showered and changed to meet Miranda at the townhome whatever lingering nostalgia she had of Nate and Lili and Doug had been erased. She knocked at the door to be greeted Miranda.

"Miranda, you look gorgeous"

Miranda smiles and says nothing. "The girls are here, they wanted to have dinner with you" she pauses as if she had just said Hitler was over for drinks or something, 'I hope that's okay?" she adds.

Andrea is nodding before she can even answer, "yes of course. Um, so do they know?"

Miranda nods, "I would never make a life altering decision without telling the core objects of my life, Andrea. "

"Right, well lead on"

Miranda smiles again, this time it's candid and sincere. The corner of her lips twitch upward and her teeth bare a little.

"Ah hello there, if it isn't the twins" she says as two identical pair of eyes turn to look at her.

"Andrea" they say in unison, a pair of lanky, thin teenagers with perfectly straightened auburn hair and braces.

"Hopefully you won't prank me into going up the stairs" she jokes.

Miranda watches the interaction, steadfast blue eyes watching the three women interact for the first time in years.

"I don't think we will need to this time" Cass says sarcastically smiling

"I think mom will take care of that one" Caro complements her sister and wink

"Girls, we're behaving right?" Miranda cautions from behind.

"We are behaving mom," Caroline says as she drops down the book she was holding and reaches out to embrace Andrea, "we're glad you are here Andy" she whispers.

"I am too" she responds.

The evening is fairly easy, the girls talk about school, and fashion and travel. They joke here and there with Andrea and Miranda who stays quiet for most of the night nods here and there. The twins retire early, since it is weekday and they both wake up for swim practice at the prep-school everyday.

"Will they come with us to the beach?" Andrea questions.

Miranda shakes her head, "no, they are spending the weekend at their father's house upstate. "

"that's a bummer, they are great young ladies"

"I'm glad you approve of my parenting" Miranda says and Andrea can't quite tell if she's joking or upset.

"I think I should retire too" she announces.

Miranda doesn't oppose, she waves her gold ringed hand and shrugs "I'll see you tomorrow?"

Andrea nods, "is everything okay? You seemed quiet"

"Everything is okay Andrea" she says handing the younger woman her coat and bag.

"It doesn't feel like it"

"It has been a long day, and the fact that I had to find out through the concierge that my guest had arrived a day earlier…'" she stops as if trying to compose herself. She clearly hadn't planned on saying this, "you didn't want to tell me Andrea? This thing you do, with hiding things from me, it is not very comforting. It alludes me to think that you don't want to tell me things, to spend time with me, to be with me. I don't want to force you here. If I went back for you was to be fair but you don't have to accept … me. If it's over, it's over. If seven years was too long, then it is what it is. But …. Before we continue this, before you get deeper in my heart, my soul, before you become someone important in the girls life, you have to tell me Andrea."

"Miranda … I alre"

The younger woman is interrupted by the older editor gently pushing her out from the foyer onto the street. "Don't answer now, think it over. Roy will take you to the hotel."

Before Andrea can register what the fuck has happened, the door closes and she finds herself with her brown coat on her left hand, leather handback on the other and mouth opened like a guppy in water. She hears the silent hum of a range rover park behind her and sees Roy's familiar face. Resigned she walks over to him and slides in the back.

"Good evening, Andrea" he greets.

"Good evening Roy, nice to see you" she says.

He nods and the rest of the ride to the Plaza is quiet.

Again, Andrea is put at a cross-road decision. She has had a lot of those in the last month. She feels like she is at the restaurant in Chicago again and Miranda is giving her a way out, or that night on the couch with Miranda trying to end what she had just started. Perhaps that is how she keeps safe, safe from heartbreak and harm. Giving people a way out, she smiles and shakes her head. She rounds back to the earlier conversation with Lili, "she isn't the same Andrea".

So, she picks up the phone and dials a florist.

"Yes, you heard me right, 84 red roses delivered as soon as possible"

In New York anything is possible, even delivering flowers at midnight


	4. Chapter 4

CHAPTER 3

Miranda laughs a lot, she is like a different version near the water. The sea air changes her smug, self-centered personality. Maybe it's just New York City, the city does that to people.

Andrea loves this version of the diva, this always laughing woman dressed in stripped, cotton blouses and jeans.

They don't accept any invitation to parties, it would be hard to explain what they are, and the few days they have they want to spend together. They dress in big hats, and retro swimsuits and hold their own martini party by the pool. Miranda laughs at Andrea's attempt at 70's hair and drinks way too much that day. The weather is perfect and again for a few days they have a perfect love, unmarred by outside influences.

If only they did not need the outside world to exist, if only they could hibernate in this house by the ocean forever, if they could stop being who they were, unattached from their families, from their responsibilities without feeling guilt, they could be happy forever.

Miranda read Lord Tennyson to Andrea at night by the pool, "I am half sick of shadows, said the Lady of Shallot" she reads in her mostly forgotten British accent now.

"How did you get rid of your accent?" Andrea questions after Miranda has read the whole poem followed by Ulysses.

"speech coach" Miranda confesses

"Why?"

Miranda shrugs, "I don't know."

"I think, it's very sexy"

"Do you now? You think it will be sexy enough to woo a certain young lawyer into bed with me?" she says in a now very pronounced accent.

Andrea laughs, rolls of laughter peel from her and she straddles the older woman without warning.

"yes, I absolutely do."

Miranda laughs again, and leans back into the lounge chaise.

"I've never heard you laugh so much Miranda, I love it."

"I love this house, my darling. I love the beach, I love being here with you" she stops.

"Promise me you will always trust me, Miranda. I can't do this always doubting thing. Promise me" she demands and Miranda nods because there is really nothing she can deny Andrea.

"I promise" she says without realizing the promise will soon be put to the test.

The following morning while having coffee, Andrea stops her actions halfway, a porcelain cup of coffee hangs midway and the butterscotch biscuit falls unceremoniously back on the plate. Andrea stoops slight from her chair, her eyes narrow at the email she has just opened in her phone.

"Andrea? Everything okay?"

She nods, "I'm not sure"

The ambiguity of her answer makes Miranda narrow her eyes and purse her lips.

"A rumor about politics and war, you know how all that goes" she says trying to seem calm and appeased, the cup that had been suspend mid-air continues the journey to Andrea's lips though she can't hide the slight shake in them. She turns and half smiles at Miranda who leans over and takes the phone away from her ex-assistant. Andrea puts the coffee cup down, a slight thud as it lands on the wooden outdoor table. The older woman covers Andreas hands with hers and whispers, "everything is going to be fine, darling"

Andrea closes her eyes and nods, letting the editor envelope her in a tender embrace. The words that East Europe is aiding underground groups to rise up here in the US worries her. Civil war is not likely, she knows it. Civil War is not likely because the government would end it, but if Europe is providing help? Is it plausible then? The email is coded, an old acquaintance from her journalism days, who's she kept in touch. He helps her with cases, she helps him with aid. An even trade.

"I know, it's delusional" she finally speaks. The hug had lasted for longer than usual, so much longer that Miranda jumps slightly, surprised by the sound of Andrea's voice. "I overreacted."

Miranda kisses her lover slightly on the cheek and walks away into the house, "let's pack to put the suitcases back in the car." Her words trail after her, like forgotten flowers from a wedding, she seemed absorb after the hug and she's silent for most of the ride home.

"Do you want me to drop you off at JFK?" she asks her companion who has fallen asleep.

Andrea wakes up momentarily, her eyes mused with sleep and her voice deep "that works"

They depart in a somber mood, miles apart from the happiness that had surrounded them back at the beach house. Miranda parks illegally and rapidly hugs Andrea, whispering "I love you Andrea" as the young brunette nods and kisses her on the cheek rapidly.

They now have a month to wait. A month that spans between uncertainty, between their lips kissing and between holding each other. The 84 flowers were symbolic, one for each of the months that made up seven years. 84 flowers that became a theme between the two women that month, Miranda sent her a bracelet with eight incrusted diamonds each 4 karats. 8 and 4, 84. Andrea put it on the night it was delivered, and she sent Miranda a picture. Miranda smiles to herself, delighting in the fact that something of hers would be on Andrea all the time.

"I think we pay you way too much" Diane joked as she saw the bracelet a few days later. Andrea laughs nervously, "I could never afford this"

"Is it from a beau?" The famous lawyer asks. Dianne is elegant in everything she does, her shoulder length blond hair is always perfectly poised as if a team of hairstylist walked around fixing her hair. She's wearing a floral print below the knee dress, and diamond earrings that could probably rival the prize of Andrea's bracelet.

Again, she laughs, "no an old friend"

"Wow, he must be a very close friend" she says laughing and grabbing a few files from her desk.

"She is" Andrea corrects her boss. There is a momentary silence from Dianne, opting to change the subject she throws the files in front of Andrea and says, "read up on these, I'm making you second chair on the Amador case"

"The Amador case?" Andrea asks

"Why are you surprised, you are coming with me"

"It's a big case, "

Dianne leans over her associate and whispers, "you want partner? You want the big leagues? You won't get there by sounding confused every time someone gives you something good. You sound like you know what the fuck you are doing, like you're going to win and eventually you do. Got it?"

Andrea nods.

"I didn't give you New York because you look pretty, although you do. I gave you New York because I know you can do it. And god knows we need more strong women in this industry. Now get up and go study those files"

Andrea sends Miranda 84 champagne filled candies with a note,

'Darling,

Celebrating without you is not as sweet. My boss just promoted me to a new, important case, but between you and me I can't wait to be in New York again.

All my love,

A'

Miranda loves getting notes from Andrea, it makes her feel that her young lover thinks of her.

There was 13 days left for Andrea's flight out of O'Hare into JFK. 13 days, she had sent for a costume made silver pendant with two numbers 8 and 4. She had left the courts early that day, the judge had accepted a recess requested by the defense. They claimed they needed time to locate their key witness. An old soldier who had seen the crime scene. Amador Garcia had been killed brutally by Chicago PD, it made news headlines. Andrea felt that the recess was unfair, they had been on trial for 3 months, hey had plenty of time to find witnesses.

She walked across Miracle mile from the jewelry store, onto a wine bar with a view of the city. She got the phone call before she saw it on the television located in the center bar.

"Natalie,"

"An… drea" she said, she sounded agitated "did you see it? Bombs"

"What are you talking about?" Andrea asks as she turns around seeking an answer. Natalie keeps talking but Andrea stops listening for a second, she sees it on the television, the buildings exploding, the people running. There is a small crowd gathered in front of the television.

"Are you listening to me?"

She feels confused, it's like New York in 2001, like the towers. She fights to concentrate, to think that this is isolated. Some lunatic making a sick statement. The bartender flips the channel, Washington has been bombed too, restricted airspace.

"Natalie, are you okay?" she finally asks, blood returning to her face.

Miranda she thinks of Miranda, of New York.

"I don't know what to do," Natalie confesses, "do you think we're safe?"

"I have to call someone else, but stay by the phone."

There is no response from her friend but she hears the click and dials Miranda.

"Miranda did you see the news?"

'Andrea, I was about to call you. Yes, it brings back horrible memories," the older editor says and yet her voice seems completely calm.

"I need you to meet me in O'Hare," Andrea mumbles knowing that it will be met with resistance.

"Are you crazy? There are no planes flying out right now, besides let's not panic. I'm sure it will be fine."

"Miranda I need you to fucking go to the following airfield and get on the plane."

"Andrea does this have to do with that email? I'm sure you're over reacting. I can't just up and leave" the editor dictates on the phone. Andrea can almost see her, a few of the wine bar patrons have left, suddenly traffic seems meager and the street a little desolate.

She sighs, "Miranda the LA times has been bombed, Sacramento and DC have been bombed, they are not trying to make a statement this is serious. New York can't be safe."

"And Chicago is?" Miranda deadpans, insolently.

"No, but we're not staying here," she says.

"Andrea?"

"I need you to fucking trust me, remember when I made you promise you would? You promised, you fucking promised, I need you uphold that promise now" Andrea's voice cracks and it seems like she's about to cry. She knows the editor will say that is not the type of trust she was talking about, but to her surprise all she hears is, "Fine Andrea I will meet you in Chicago"

Relief washes over the young brunette, she feels it prickle down from the tip of her head to her arms and tears finally come down.

"Good"

It takes a few hours for news outlets to release information, the government has declared war on Russia, and Syria and Japan. West Europe remains silent to the turmoil that has transcribed in a few hours. No official statements backing any side up. The following two days would reveal that Germany wanted to stay neutral, 'we will not be dragged into another world war' the chancellor says and though her decision is unpopular in the eyes of the scared world, Germans thank her. It's too early to tell if it will escalade to full-fledged war, no more shots are fired for a week. UN negotiations hold a lifeline between the fractions.

Andrea and Miranda have driven to Los Angeles, "we can't take a plane" Andrea states

"Are you sure this scare is worth leaving everything for?" Miranda asks irritated on the second day of driving. Andrea nods.

They hear it the day they got to Los Angeles, the pipes underneath the city exploded in New York, the financial district is in chaos. Miranda looks down as they wait at a red light.

"Natalie is waiting for us"

Miranda doesn't answer back. Andrea doesn't prove. That night they hear that US nationals are being gathered and sent home from France and England.

The house that Natalie still owns is beautiful, large window panes that lead to ocean. Andrea had forgotten how beautiful it was here. She remembers thinking that Miranda would love Newport Beach, and now here she is. She sees Miranda a few feet in front of her, a shadow against the setting sun. Natalie gave them time to change and shower before dinner. Andrea doesn't approach the Ice Queen, she watches from afar, she wonders if she completely over reacted. They didn't need to leave their homes. People lived through world wars and civil wars, war rarely reaches suburbia. She feels she's right though, that this isn't a simple conflict that will be solved with negotiations, besides getting away will be good for all of them.

"She's certainly something else" Natalie whispers as she approaches her long-time friend with a glass of wine.

"She is" Andrea muses

"You and her are like oil and water. I can see the attraction though, the immaculate, perfect, powerful woman, who turns out to be completely opposite once you break her shell. You were always a sucker for romantic novels."

Miranda turns and smiles at the younger pair, "shall we start dinner?"

Natalie and Andrea both nod in unison and as if out of thin air Natalie giver Miranda a glass of wine.

"Your house is gorgeous Natalie, I'm glad I finally got to meet you."

"So, I'm I Miranda. So, I'm I. Perhaps these are not the best circumstances but nonetheless"

That night Miranda questions Andrea "What are we doing here? "

"We are driving to Mexico City tomorrow" the former journalist answers and turns her back toward Miranda. She expects more questions but is met with only one.

"Does Natalie know?"

"She's coming with"

"The borders will close, right?" Miranda questions and there is a detectable sadness in her voice.

Andrea doesn't bother to answer.


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

The house is empty, just as Andrea remembers. She spent her childhood here, holding her grandmothers hand and drinking Horchata after school. The white fenced doors need a little paint, but otherwise the house has held her own for the last decade. The last time Andrea visited was to enforce her grandmothers will, and put the estate in her name. Olivia Nieto had left her everything, though Olivia and Andrea's mother did not keep in touch after Andrea left Mexico forced by her parents, the elegant Mexican lady kept in touch with her granddaughter. In fact Richards first law firm had been started with a loan from Mrs. Nieto, a loan that perhaps was never re-payed. For a long time Andrea considered changing her name to Nieto, she still wanted to but never got around to it.

"This house is beautiful Andrea," Natalie whispered and for a second drew her friend out of the haze. Andrea nodded, it truly was. The house in the best area of the city was beautiful indeed. Rich mahogany wood lined the living room and marble lined the formal dining room. Grand curtain rods fell from the tall ceilings glass windows oversaw the front garden. Her grandmother loved light, and flowers, the vintage wallpaper off-white and peeling in some hidden corners gave in a majestic air.

Andrea felt the same airless sadness she would feel in her dreams. Walking in this house, in the stillness of the memories standing around her she felt hallow. She wanted to cry, close her eyes and cry. She was finally back home, but home wasn't here anymore. The memories were ghosts, ghosts of yesterday that shaped who she was and gave her eternal sadness. Slowly she walked into the studio, dark bookcases lined the walls and glass decorations still stood proud. Here her grandfather used to sit and read the bible, crossed legged and with a glass of whiskey. She could see him now, sitting on the sofa, glasses perched on the edge of his nose.

"would you like me to read to you?" he'd ask.

The studio also had a glass panel, guarded by decorative white iron, from here you could see the back garden. The rose bushes her grandmother had planted ere drying and overgrown but the white long tulips still bloomed in the tempered city climate.

She let the two women wander around, she had gotten food delivered and they were putting it away.

Mindlessly she climbed the stairs, to the bedrooms, each half opened and filled with shadows. Her grandparents room was the first she entered. Dark and cold, the bed stood in the center of the room still, everything else as covered in white sheets, the dark green velvet curtains were fading and made no attempt to pull them shut. On the nightstand was her grandmother's crucifix, and everything stirred in her. She used to reproach God for taking her away from Mexico City, from her grandmother, from happiness.

She wanted her grandmother to be there, to tell her everything was going to be all right, she wanted the dark-haired woman to dry her tears, to hold out a cup of tea on her wrinkled hands and laugh with her as they went through outfits to wear. Instead she felt Miranda hold her, softly and proving. Andrea cried into the shoulder of her lover, perhaps it was exhaustion from driving or confusion from the world falling apart but she felt weak, she had no strength to continue, at least not for that night.

The news from the north only got darker. High politicians were murdered, people were fleeing to the banks, taking their money out, they were being turned away from airports and the neighboring countries closed their borders. Mexican citizens had returned by the hundreds, the ones still in the estates were trapped. Mexico plagued by drug cartels and not enough resources did not want to risk chaos. Those who opposed the actions of the elected government in the north faced trial and disappearance. Europe remained impartial, and though neither Russia nor any of the other accused parties had responded the war rally, the bombings kept happening all over the states.

"I'm glad I trusted you" Miranda jokes one morning. At least in the city life continues on as if nothing were happening Andrea has gotten full access to the will and the funds, all three women are living a surreal escapade. Miranda goes to Plaza Santa Fe once a week to keep herself entertained, she visits the Gucci store and usually buys something. She now has a collection of Gucci scarfs that Natalie likes to use for every outfit she has, which is not many. Natalie mostly stays home, or visits the neighbors who are also foreign nationals here on a post from France. They feed her bonbons and marzipan and Aida the wife plays bridge with her. Andrea goes down to the city center a lot, mostly by herself bus sometimes she takes Natalie too. They eat avocado flavored ice – cream and drink red wine with mole. Natalie likes to buy traditional art and Andrea humors her. The three women go to Sanborn's café twice a week, they eat something different each time, though Miranda always tries to sneak away with Tomato Pasta soup, and no one talks about Miranda's lack of dietary constriction, or the three glasses whiskey Andrea has at the restaurant followed by other three at home. They don't talk about the future but they watch the news in silence almost religiously.

"I am going to start writing our memoirs" Miranda announced one Friday night as they are getting ready to go to the ambassador's gala. Natalie has refused to go, she feels tired and has caught the flu or something. Miranda has bought a new cocktail dress, black silk and gold bodice, Andrea is using a silver shimmer one that used to belong to her grandmother. Miranda has taken the side in, complaining that Andrea should just have bought a new one while at the same time bragging that she was an excellent seamstress.

Andrea was already drinking. Miranda repeats herself and Natalie who is brushing her hair laughs and says," can you say I was the most beautiful of the three?"

Somehow that one simple joke breaks the tension of the past few months and Andrea sits down, complete exhausted. "I feel like we have slipped through a certain crack. Like we are stealing time, and sooner or later it's all going to catch up with us"

"Andrea let's not be negative, not tonight"

The three women brood over what has been said. None of them have said it but they think it every day. Communication to California or New York has been restricted and monitored, the borders are closed except to certain factions. The UN negotiations have fallen through and most major countries have pulled their embassies out of the US. The country that used to be the example of democracy is now the example of a failed model. It is rumored the government has made the factions disappear, though uneven bombings continue to be heard of. Russia has openly declared war and Hawaii as well as Guam have been hit repeatedly. Tankers have been sunk and planes constantly circle the skies at night.

The previous week a cyber-attack shut down light panels in 10 major cities across the nation and the intelligence agencies took days to recover.

Andrea has heard rumors that the resistance as it has started to be called was escaping though what used to be cartel tunnels. They were making way to Mexico to regroup and get new allies.

War does make strange bedfellows, she though as she mingled in the brightly lit soiree at the embassy. Everyone here laughed and sparkled, drinking old fashions and elderflower cocktails avoiding talk of the troubled northern neighbor. It reminded the young lawyer of movies she had seen about WWII, Nazi officers in rich soirées without care about what was happening outside the walls. Miranda glances from across the room, she knows exactly what her lover is thinking. She locks eyes with her and a few minutes later waltz out into the city air. The night is dark, their driver pulls up and they ride hand in hand back to the house.

They haven't really talked about their relationship in the months that have passed. It was quiet and unspoken, they were together and nothing else needed to be said.

"I need to bring the girls home, Europe is no longer safe" Miranda says that night as they sit in the back garden and drink eucalyptus tea.

"home?" Andrea asks

"This is home for now, I guess" she says

"Do they want to come?" Andrea asks

Miranda shakes her head, "they are young idealists, who think they can help more there.."

"I remember what that was like"

"And their father thinks they are safer there than here. I miss them so much Andrea," she pauses.

"You will see them soon," she says hoping it's true.

"When all this is over, will you still love me?" Miranda asks. She wanted to say she was sure of the answer but she was afraid when silence washed over the night.

"I will always love you, Miranda. There will never be anyone else," Andrea confesses.

"And what will we be?" Miranda continues taking her lovers hand and drawing circles in the inside.

Andrea inhales the musty air, it wasn't hot, but it wasn't cold, they still sat dressed in cocktail dresses and full makeup. Miranda was confused and frustrated, how long could they keep this charade for? How long before war come looking for them too? Would this end? Would her home country ever go back to being what it was.

"Marry me, Miranda" Andrea declares and she unclenches her free hand revealing a thin, gold ring. Vintage and fragile, it boasted an emerald not a diamond in the center, it hung on the ring with an unconventional mount. "It used to be my grandmothers, my grandfather gave it to her for their 50th anniversary, it was meant to replace her original ring that was essentially worthless, since they both were poor. He told her the emerald was more beautiful than a diamond, full of color, and life and dreams and the mount was custom made because he said, she deserved unconventional. I thought it would be perfect for you, for us"

Miranda opens her mouth, casting her eyes toward the ring in Andrea's open hand. She's shocked and confused. It isn't that she doesn't want to marry this woman, it's that this woman didn't want to marry her.

"Miranda?' Andrea probed reaching out for Miranda's left hand and looking up at her diamond blue eyes.

"Andrea? I…" she wanted to make sure this was because Andrea loved her, and wanted this, that she wouldn't regret it as soon as the war was over.

"Is that a no? Miranda, I thought you wanted this, me, us"

Miranda snaps out of the trance she was in, she takes the ring out of Andrea's hand and holds it captive in her own. Looking straight at the large chocolate eyes she whispers, "Of course I do, I want us more than anything in the world. Nothing would make me happier than to be your wife, but I don't want you to do this because you think it's what I want. I don't want you to do this because we are in our own little world, far from our friends, from your family, Andrea I want you to be sure"

"I am," Is all Andrea says and reaches over to put the ring on Miranda's finger, "it looks beautiful on you"

"You and Natalie are all the family I have, being here has made me realize this. Now fiancée, will you kiss me?"

Miranda bubbles over with laughter, loud and incandescing, Natalie stumbles out the patio door, sleepy and slightly inebriated.

"Oh! Andrea did you do it?" she asks.

"you knew too?" Miranda questions now both her and Andrea are up and half hugging, half twirling in the grass.

"Of course, Miranda"

The scene if someone were to see it from afar was perfect. Both women in beautiful gowns, hair made up, laughing in the gleam of the moonlight, Natalie in white robes and hair down laughing along with them. The night was darker than usual, the grass was moist with dew, the air was crisp and silent. No one would guess the world around them was falling apart, that they were exiles from their country, in the dark about what was about to happen.

The New York Times, Elias Clarke, Random House all bombed the following morning, nothing was being done. Outside news outlets claimed it was the government who was bringing all the chaos, destroying liberal media, hushing the country and giving way to the alt-right to creep in from the shadows. But everyone had known that, from the Inaugural Address. Miranda didn't talk the whole day, she simply stared at her ring and the grass outside. Natalie and Andrea knew better than to say a single thing.

The months in Mexico soon became a year and the borders still remained closed. England, Italy and Spain had declared they would support America but no action had been taken on European soil yet. The EU was breathing shallow these days, with Eastern countries aided by France, Germany wanting to remain neutral and all the factions breaking away right before it's eyes.

In Mexico things were starting to feel tense too. Violence had soared in the city, Natalie arrived once afternoon in tears and white as a ghost.

"Natalie what's wrong?" Miranda asked as she descended the stairs.

"I lost the car" she said simply as she sat down in the kitchen table and poured a shot of the first brown alcohol she could find.

They had agreed on buying one car and using the older Buick that her grandparents still had in the garage, with a few mechanical fixtures of course. Miranda and Natalie took turns driving the new Mercedes while Andrea for the most part drove the black Buick. Today she had gone to buy groceries, Miranda was alone.

"What do you mean?"

"I … someone assaulted me gun point" Natalie stuttered out as poignantly as she could in between sobs. She was shaking, Miranda put her hands on her shoulders and tried to calm her.

"but you're okay, right, that is all that matters"

Natalie nodded but kept crying, this was the scene Andrea walked into.

"Oh my God, what happened?" she asked dropping the bags at the door, a tomato rolled out but no one noticed.

"Miranda? Natalie?"

"Calm down darling, Natalie was assaulted, they took the car but we are all okay"

"I'm pregnant" Natalie blurts out and both women look at her and think it is the stress from the incidents today.

"I went to the doctor, he confirmed it."

Miranda and Andrea look at the glass of alcohol she's holding. Another surreal thing. The whole year has been like a trip down the rabbit hole.

"What?" Miranda asks as ineloquently as both younger woman have ever heard her.

They are going to need more whiskey, maybe not Natalie, but what the fuck. She servers three more shots, they all drink them, guilt and confusion in their eyes. Once the moment passes Miranda speaks again, "Who is the father?"

"Adrian"

"Natalie what the fuck are you doing? What do you think we are doing here? On vacation? You fucked our neighbor? Oh god and you went over and had lunch with his wife! I don't even know what to say. Why would you be so careless? What are we going to do now? What the fuck, we're stuck here and you are whoring around" frustration rings in her voice, she brings her hands up to her eyes.

"Darling why don't' I get you a glass of wine and we talk about this later, Natalie has had a bad shock, I'll make her some tea, we will all calm down and order dinner? Okay?"

Andrea nods, she always nods to Miranda.

The wine makes a noise as it pours, "Don't be too hard on her darling. We all make mistakes, besides a child is always a blessing. Promise me we'll take care of her"

"Of course we will; she's like my sister. I just don't understand what was going to through her head"

"Aida knows" Natalie is standing on the portico, both women no .

"Okay, she knows you're pregnant?"

"She knows we had an affair, she was okay with it. She doesn't know I'm pregnant."

"Well we won't be able to hide it for too long" Miranda says.

The pregnancy is an unexpected move, like someone is playing chess with them and they are losing. Ultimately is not the pregnancy that makes them move but the creeping violence that has gotten out of hand. People in the neighborhood are being kidnapped, illegal fighters from the north have gotten into Mexico they ask for money and then they use it to buy guns, weapons and allies in the northern war. Rumors about the violence and the bombings eroding the northern borders, and crossing over to the North States rounds in the news cycles. Durango, Sonora and Tijuana are drug territory. The cartels will do anything for money, kill, kidnap, rob, rape, smuggle. The Mexican government is knee deep in corruption with the drug lords, the war in the north and the closing of the borders has affected their drug imports. New ways to make money must be made. Germany pulled its ambassador from Mexico City last week.

"My grandmother had an hacienda in the south, I used to spend summers there as a child. I think we should go there. The city is getting too dangerous for the moment. I don't want the risk it with Natalie pregnant, it has been 3 months since we found out. She has to be about to show. What do you think?"

Miranda is getting ready to go to the plaza. She has a facial appointment today; her hair is perfectly combed and she has opted for a dark mahogany lipstick shade that matches her Gucci scarf and the white dress she's wearing.

"Come with me, we'll have a nice dinner, some wine, we'll buy something we don't need. We can get you a ring too. We really haven't celebrated," the older woman asks and turns around from the vanity mirror to the sofa where Andrea sits.

"I'm not dressed to go out," she says although anyone watching would disagree.

She's got on mid-calf pants dark brown and a pearl blouse, "put on the camel colored coat and you'll be perfect." Miranda instructs and as always gets her way.

"I feel like we've been together forever" Andrea says as the wine arrives.

They bought a modest engagement ring, more a symbol than anything else.

"that's because we're living through a war Andrea, wars do that to people. The world is falling apart around us. We haven't spoken to our family or friends forever, it seems like it is just you and me for now.

"Have you talked to the girls" she asks

Miranda nods, "they are staying in Germany with their father. The only safe place for now it seems. What an irony "

Andrea nods.

"You look beautiful Miranda, I sometimes don't say it to you, but you do. I look at you and I remember why I fell in love with you"

Miranda blushes, the queen of fashion, used to having compliments left and right blushes. Andrea notes that.

"Let's leave this week" Miranda speaks, "I think it will be good for all of us"

And they do, they all pack up the old Buick and drive down south to the peninsula, to the warm ocean and coffee plantations. The change will be good for them, it has to be.


	6. Chapter 6

CHAPTER 6.

The hacienda is a vast expanse of what used to be glory. Andrea remembers riding horses and all the flower fields that grew. The family made no money from the property it was their vacation home, in the family for generations. Her grandmother would always complain about the heat, her slight curvy hair would frizz and she'd have to put it up in a bun which she found odious.

The three women found the work of cleaning and restoring the hacienda therapeutic. They could for at least moments forget they were in a limbo or sorts. Andrea started cleaning the grounds the very next day of their arrival. She spent all morning out in the large fields collecting all the hay and trash that had been accumulated. They had someone come a few times a year and clean it but it clearly had not been enough.

When she finally came into the main house she found Natalie asleep and Miranda sitting by the piano drinking lukewarm coffee, lukewarm coffee. The fashion diva who always wanted hot, 'and I mean' hot coffee, who would fire any assistant who did not deliver it the temperature of the sun, was drinking warm coffee like nothing in the world mattered.

"Don't look so surprised, Andrea. We've been through so much shit, we're sitting in your families semi-abandoned farm the temperature of my coffee is the last thing on my mind."

Andrea understands the sentiment but nonetheless, sits down in her just showered hair and cries.

Miranda knows it isn't the coffee, it's the implausibility of everything that has happened to them. She wants to tell her lover this isn't' the time to cry, that they have to be strong, that they have to figure out some way to make money while they are here, she wants to tell her that they now will have to take care of Natalie, and what will they do about the birth? But, this isn't the time.

"I'll make you dinner, why don't you play me something? I know you play, what was your grandmothers favorite song?"

Andrea smiles, she loves that Miranda understands the deep connect her and her grandmother had. She sits by the piano, Miranda stirs and sets a plate of salad down. The brunette plays a few notes without a theme then she focuses. She doesn't have the music sheets but she doesn't need them, she can play this song in her sleep. 'Unforgettable' by Nat King Cole. The tempo is slow and melancholic, it soaks up all the tears that both women want to shed. Andrea loops it twice, Miranda doesn't seem to notice. When the song ends she's sitting down next to Andrea.

Andrea leans slightly into Miranda and starts playing Cielito Lindo, a Mexican mariachi song that was her and her grandmother's song for each other. She mouths the words, whispering them, knowing Miranda doesn't understand them but can feel the pain hollowed in the syllables.

"We need a song Andrea, what is our song?" she asks she wants to hear Andrea play forever. The Aztec sun has set beyond the hacienda, outside the windows are only shadows.

Andrea doesn't have to think, and Miranda recognizes the song in at the first note.

"Sway, sway with me" she sings softly. Natalie could hear the pair, the piano notes and the wisp of Miranda's voice and she smiles. Miranda and Andrea make the perfect pair, she had so many doubts about them at first. Andrea had always been so reluctant to speak of Miranda, she had practically shunned out love for her former boss. And when Miranda finally showed up, demanding so much Natalie had though she was crazy. But now seeing them together, seeing them endure things that most couples never endure she knows they are meant for something. She doesn't know what the future will bring, but she knows this child will change her life and that if she were ever to be missing, both women would take care of the baby.

Miranda sings Sway constantly, for some reason she has ended up in charge of the domestic work, cooking, cleaning the house, washing the dishes. They don't want to hire help because though they can afford it, they can afford to make over the whole farm, buy cattle and have maids. They choose not to bring attention to themselves. Three women living alone in the south of Mexico. Though it has become less dangerous than the north and the city, there are still dangers lurking below the surface. They try to leave the hacienda as little as possible, Andrea being the only one that speaks Spanish goes to the market, buys food and tells the locals that she's here on vacation from the nearby city.

"Andrea, we can't keep this forever," Miranda says as they crawl into bed a few months later. The upkeep of the terrain has taken a toll on both women. Andrea's hands are cracked and dry, her skin has gotten sunburnt and she is always tired. The week before she bought two cows and a dog. Milky and Mae she named them and Clementine was the scot terrier she had bought. Miranda has ran out to see the puppy and let it sit all over her dark dress.

Clementine slept with Natalie most of the time, no one had told it to. The little puppy had chosen to all on her own.

"I don't think we will have to" Andrea says cuddling up to her lover.

Miranda doesn't push. Natalie is due any day now. All three women are worried, she hasn't seen a doctor for all the pregnancy, and though she herself thinks everything is normal, she worries about the birth, and the baby.

Miranda doesn't sleep that night, she extracts herself from her lover and looks out through the window. The ring on her hand seems to exist in a whole different dimension. The two of them in cocktail dresses and Canadian tea. She thinks of her days at Runway, it is less than two year ago. She spoke to Nigel last week. The closest person she ever had as a friend had called her daughters. They had given her his number.

"Miranda! You disappeared" he said

She didn't reveal much just that she was safe, and happy.

"I'm in Mexico," he told her, "30 minutes out from the city. Lots of tequila here."

"How is the city?" she asked

"Horrid, rampart with crime. People barely exit after 8pm you know. Such a shame, I came out here for so many shoots. It was such a beautiful place, filled with museums, palaces and history." He sounded nostalgic on the phone.

"I don't have a lot of time, Nigel," she sounded agitated her hear beat fast inside her ribcage.

"Of course, well here is what I've got."

He had told her of Elias Clarke, what he knew of the few people that had escaped. All major designers were still good and trending in Europe but the American continent was a mess.

Troops from the EU coalition were marching toward Syria and Russia but the UN had been pretty much dismantled, Section 5 had been called, no one agreed, France left the table.

Various French monuments had been bombed. Refugees were living on the streets. Germany had closed borders too. Miranda knew her daughters were safe, but she worried. She worried that something bad might happen, and she would not be there.

Their chat had been brief but he had told her the New York senator was staying at the house of the Oaxaca governor, a few miles away from where Miranda was. She should pay a visit. Miranda knew that Andrea would disagree. The young lawyer for all her talk of being jaded was still an idealist at heart.

Miranda went because she needed civilization like water in the dessert. Put on her best suit, her best make up, and showed up like she was visiting Valentino at a run through. In the end, she would tell herself she did it for her daughters. It was an excuse that would hold up against everything.

"My, my Miranda!" John Walker exclaimed.

"John, darling Nigel had told me you were here" she said. It was so natural being this other person. The diva everyone admired and respected. She liked it. She had missed it.

"Sit down, let me introduce you to Ramon Aguirre the governor, who graciously offered his home."

"Ms. Priestly I've heard so much about you," the tall governor says in heavy Mexican accent.

"I can't say the same" she deadpans.

"May I offer some whiskey, or wine, tequila perhaps?" the governor tries again.

"Miranda, Ramon here has some tequila to die for, won't you have some?"

Time escapes Miranda, she's not sure what she had expected visiting the senator. He had been a good friend back in New York, his wife Laura was big in the fashion circles. She wasn't sure what she had gone for but she had come out with more than she bargained for. The information she learned ate her at the core. The senator's wife was dead, the governor knew an attack from the drug cartels was coming, they were going to let it happen. Money guaranteed that they were safe. The senator had invested in the area, after the war was over he wanted resorts.

"who knows when the states will be stable and safe, but here, this peninsula. It is paradise on Earth."

"Where the fuck where you?" Andrea asks as she unlocks the door hours later.

"Hello is customary, "

"don't give me your Miranda Priestly dismissive attitude, I've been worried sick. You left before I came back from the market, it's been hours. Fucking hours Miranda, I thought you were dead. Natalie went into labor, I needed you." Andrea sobs between screams and frustration.

"Oh darling" Miranda feels guilt crawl over her.

"you smell like alcohol, Miranda where the fuck where you? Fucking tell me! I … we're in this together! Aren't we? What the fuck is going on? You've been different for days. Natalie had the baby and you weren't here! What is something went wrong? You didn't even care?"

"Jesus Andrea you're being dramatic!"

"Dramatic? Dramatic? Don't give me dramatic. You have no right? You are not fucking Miranda Priestly here! You're nobody, this is my house! My money! You've got no bargaining chip here"

Miranda is silent she's stunned, she hears the coo of a baby nearby and makes an attempt to walk.

"Don't you fucking dare!" Andrea steps in front of her, "you haven't earned the right to."

Miranda stands there alone in the dark kitchen, she doesn't move. She knows she shouldn't have left without telling Andrea, but what would she have told her. She knows it's her fault but she also didn't expect the brunette to hurl the fact that here in Mexico Miranda was practically destitute. She would never have done the same, they were lovers, soulmates, bound by two rings, she's unaware of the tears that fall down her face. She doesn't climb to their shared bedroom instead she opts to go into Natalie's bedroom. The woman is fast asleep, Miranda pulls up the chair next to the bed and sets her head down.

The baby was a girl, Olivia Rose. Olivia for Andrea's grandmother and Rose for Natalie's. The little girl was gorgeous, she had inherited her mother's blue eyes and blond hair. Miranda and Andrea didn't talk for days, expect for the necessary.

"Are you mad at her?" Natalie asks her best friend

"No, "

"you two haven't spoken a word, "

"She still hasn't told me where she went"

Natalie shakes her head, but says nothing.

Miranda goes back to the governor's house, she goes back a few times. They become friends.

"You own the Hacienda on the edge of town?" he asks

She shakes her head, "No it was my friend's family who owned it"

Now she feels like Andrea must feel, trying to hide their relationship. She looks down at her emerald ring and wonders when this madness will end. All she wants to do is go home, to New York and marry Andrea. New York suddenly seems like a fool's errand, she'd settle for Mexico City, with Andrea and Natalie.

Instead she ends up in bed with the senator. She tells herself that this will guarantee they are all safe but she's lying to herself. He wants her to come live at the governors' mansion. They are about to take the haciendas from the people, he confides in her. She spends all night holding little Olivia, Natalie knows something is off.

"Miranda?" she asks

"Natalie, sorry I didn't mean to wake you. I just forgot how beautiful holding a baby is"

Natalie smiles in the darkness, "Miranda somethings wrong. I can tell. Tell me"

"Nothing is wrong, Andrea and I had a fight'

"A month ago!" Natalie corrects, "You two had a fight a month ago and you've made no attempt to fix it. For someone who traveled across the nation twice to patch a love you don't seem interested any more. Is that it? Have you lost interest? This domestic, deglamorized, no longer powerful attorney doesn't do it for you? Miranda, Andrea loves you. I hope you know how much."

"I know how much Natalie. I love her the same" Miranda hands the baby to its mother and walks out of the room.

Natalie shakes her head, Miranda is hiding something.

The coup doesn't come right away, in fact it takes months in the making.

Miranda and Andrea don't talk about that night, but they patch over whatever is hiding between then. Miranda goes back to sleep with Andrea and the make love every night. Andrea wants to hold on to the older lover, she's always felt at a disadvantage Miranda was too much for her, too beautiful, too glamorous, too grand. She felt her lover slipping from her hands. It could not be right? Miranda had said she loved her, she wanted to marry her. Miranda's two previous marriages came to mind and suddenly that didn't seem so important. Those thoughts plagued Andrea often, as her head rested down Miranda's thighs, as her lips licked her porcelain skin, as her hands roamed the deep expanses of heat.

Miranda felt guilt every time she touched Andrea, she was hiding so much from her. She wasn't sure why. She wasn't sure why she always hurt those she loved, she could not help it. They always forgave her. Would Andrea forgive her?

Olivia turned a year a day after the guns rattled all over the little town. Andrea had been away at the market, Miranda didn't know the exact day. She had thought that perhaps they had retracted, but they hand not.

Miranda went to the governor's every time Andrea went to the market now. Natalie watched her leave, didn't mention a thing to Andrea.

The raids were fast and violent, news traveled to the market fast. Andrea drove faster than she ever had. She'd never forget the scene, the blood dripping from the door, drops one after the other. It really does slide down slowly, like the movies show it. She can't move for long moments. Then she runs all over the house, and doesn't see Miranda, but Natalie is lying next to the kitchen door. The blood is hers, "Andy!"

"Natalie, you're going to be okay, it's going to be okay" she stammers holding the open wound that has stained the light blue dress, her long blond tresses are stained with blood too and her usual bubbling eyes, are red and stormy.

"No, I won't. I'm a doctor Andrea remember? No lies" she murmurs in chills and teeth clattering. Andrea has to be the strong one.

"Promise me you'll watch over Olivia? I want her to live with you. When all this is over, I want her to stay with you. Do not ever give her to my parent's" she whispers.

Andrea nods.

"Promise me, Andrea!" the dying woman screams and winces from pain.

"Promise" she whispers and hears the baby cry in the distance.

"Promise me you'll tell her about me, and watch her grow into a happy woman. And if .." she gasps for air every few seconds"

Andrea wants to tell her to stop trying, to save her strength but she knows she can't save her friend. She'd need an ambulance and a hospital that would not report back to the governor.

"And if… if Miranda isn't there with you…. Pr… Promise me you'll … you'll be strong alone."

"I promise" she says and wonders why Natalie would say that.

It doesn't' take more than 10 minutes for Natalie to stop breathing. She sits there for hours, ignoring the child crying and the distant gun sounds. Like solitary booms in a ghost town. Natalie's hands are cold and hard, she'll have to bury her. She'll do that tomorrow. What time is it? The harsh exhaustion of tears hit her, her eyes fell like sandpaper and her body wants to lie down next to Natalie's.

Images of them in college flash through her mind, time has gone by so quickly.

She hears the click of heels.

"Get up" Miranda instructs.

"Miranda, Oh my god, I though they took you too" Andrea says, and tears of relief wash over the young woman. She felt so alone, so cold, so abandoned. Where was God she had thought. The God that her parent's spoke of. The one her grandmother prayed to religiously every day, clear rosary pearls passing through wrinkled hands slowly. The God that this whole damn country believed in, pilgrimaging to the Basilica and the Cathedral. She wanted to ask God personally why he would let all this happen. How could he punish sin, love, like Miranda and hers and not do a single thing to save a whole country drowning in war. She wanted to but she could not because deep inside she still believed in every single word her grandmother had made her repeat as a child. They say that a Catholic's faith is never lost just forgotten. And she was remembering every verse,

'Our father who are in heaven…" she had prayed crouching against the wall, hoping the distant shots would end soon, and the sirens would quiet down and Miranda would return. Hoping that they can be safe, and the war be over and the US free. That she can see her mother and father and that Miranda can see the twins.

She is living on hope.

"Get up" Miranda repeats she's holding the child and a suitcase.

Andrea looks up at the harsh words of her lover and finally takes in how Miranda looks.

She's not disheveled or dirty; she's wearing a black pencil skirt part of a suit, with white embroidery on the left shoulder. It looks like something out of a 1940's movie, she's got small heels on and she doesn't recognize the suitcase. The child is wrapped in an elegant blanket.

"What … where are you going?" Andrea asks confused, grabbing on to the wall and the floor to get up.

"I don't have time to explain. I need you to take this and Olivia and go," she says in her Miranda Priestly voice.

"Go where?" Andrea starts confused, she doesn't understand what is happening.

"If you had been here they would have killed you too. They are taking the land. You need to go," she repeats and shoves the child into Andrea's arms.

"And you?" she asks afraid of the answer.

"You can't go to the house in the city. The government is repossessing the mansions in that area, using them as communication centers. I need you to follow these instructions," she hands Andrea a piece of paper and puts the suitcase on the floor. "I need you to leave now."

"You betrayed me, again? You hurt someone you love to… said to love… and only thought of yourself," Andrea asks but there is no question in her voice. No raised syllable, no expectation of an answer.

Miranda turns around and walks away.

"Fuck you Miranda! We saved your life! And you throw us out like nothing!"

"You wouldn't understand" the diva murmurs with a slight shake of her hand.

"What wouldn't I understand? That everyone wants to be you?"

Miranda knew it was going to be hard, but not this hard. Would it ever be excusable what she is doing? True love would risk fleeing with Andrea, they would figure out everything along the way. The love she professed back at Andrea's Chicago loft would never abandon. Perhaps she had been mistaken, perhaps it had never been love. She told herself she had to be safe and have the means to bring her daughters back, Andrea would understand that, one day.

She had to.


	7. Chapter 7

CHAPTER 7.

~present

The wind wept against the flimsy metal and banged against the hard mountain side. Olivia rarely fussed but today she was grabbing on to Andrea for dear life. Her toddler hands held tightly to the cheap sweater Andrea had on, and she buried her fair face on the crook of Andrea's arms.

"Shhh, it's okay darling. Todo esta bien" she murmured the blonde child.

"Mommy, miedo, tengo miedo" the little girl called her mommy. Olivia was too young to explain, and the circumstances were not the best. She would let her call her mother until she was older. Perhaps two more years. When she turns five, she'll understand a little better. She spoke to Olivia in both English and Spanish, who knows where they would end up.

The wind blew with fury all night, but the morning alike always proved to be full on sunshine and birds singing to the aurora.

Andrea got up with dawn break, like she always did. She would dress Olivia and they would strut to the market to find food. Andrea would help the vendors carry cases, watch their carts or cut fruits most mornings, in turn they would give her little scraps of food, or clothes. During the spring she'd collect flowers and sell them to the patrons. She mostly saved that money and they used it during winter when the cold was so harsh that the market would sometimes not open and they would have to walk miles down to buy some food from the town. She didn't like going into town a ragged little outpost, miles away from Puebla. The locals were nosy and Andrea feels like everyone is watching. Although no one knew her here, they were far north from the Hacienda and far south from the city that the chances of finding someone she knew were slim. She didn't want to find anyone who might compromise her safety. The war had quieted in the last two years, the cartels had killed each other off in some instances and in others made truces, perhaps because the presidency of Manzanar was about to end and they didn't know what would come next. The quieting of the war had come on the heels of impeachment and arraignment of the US president. The party had restructured, aided with troops from France and Russia. The UN had supported invasion though it never got to that. Andrea had spoken to her mother a few months ago. She hadn't revealed a single thing, and her mother was just glad she was alive. Richard had been among some of the missing in Chicago, that was almost 4 years ago, her mother had lost hope. Everyone else was safe she had told her. She had asked if she was coming home. Andrea had said that she would eventually.

Talking to her mother gave her hope, she wasn't so alone. Peace was being signed under the new President and hopefully she would be able to return home. She thought of Miranda every day. Sometimes it was pure rage that kept her going. With her moth-eaten clothes and her boots that seemed to be losing more of their sole all the time. Rage that made her get by with scraps of food and old bread. Rage that kept her from not breaking down when she found spiders and insects crawling on her bed. Other times she missed Miranda terribly, she missed the way the older woman just understood her, she missed her piercing blue eyes, her sarcasm, the way she would hold her when the world was falling apart, in the darkest of times.

She missed the promises they had made to each other. Mirada had said she was afraid that the young lawyer would leave, and it was her who left. At the first sign of distress, she left.

Andrea had only ever felt heartbreak for Miranda, but it was soft and pensive. Before Chicago they had never really been in a relationship. This heartbreak was desolate, hopeless, it was tissue and blood piercing inside her chest. It was blood overflowing into blue lungs and suffocating her, it was all the demons that haunted her before. She had taken to cutting like she used to when she was young. The first year out in the Nevada, the cold, the despair led to a few episodes. It helped relieve the stress, but she stopped it. It wasn't a healthy habit it she planned to get out of this shit hole and raise Olivia.

This morning with the warmth of the sun, she dug through her suitcase to find something to put inside her boots, something to not let the moisture in. She found an old velour wrap on the inside pocket. How had she never seen it before? As she unwrapped the item something tumbled out and clattered on the floor. Andrea looked down, dumfounded. The bracelet Miranda had bought her, the eight diamonds and 4 karats over silver. The second item was the pendant she had bought for Miranda but never actually gave her. The 84 numeric pendant she had made specially for her. It all seemed like a lifetime ago, not a few years. She could sell the pieces they would bring in good money, enough to get them a small apartment somewhere. She opts to sell only the bracelet, for some unknown reason she keeps the pendant wrapped up in her pocket. She's right, it gives her enough to find a white washed apartment on the bottom of the Nevada. It has only one room only one tiny window and a stove. It is a thousand times better than the tin roof and the insets crawling. She can buy food at the store now, and she enjoys seeing Olivia play with a doll she manages to buy. Olivia is oblivious to the poverty around her, the fear instilled in everyone's face and Andrea assumes this is what innocence must be like. Here she can get radio new and buy the paper. She reads that a peace agreement has been reached in the US and troops are seizing the illegal government property, the hope is the new president of Mexico will ally himself with the UN and that he will return seized property to its owners too. It wasn't just homes but whole companies were 'absorbed' by the government just like PeMex the petroleum giant was back in the 30's.

"You see darling there may be hope" she smiles at the little girl sitting cross legged on the floor. "I promise I'm getting you out of here, I promised your mother I'd keep you safe and I will do that even if I have to sell my soul"

She has seen a picture of Miranda in the paper, next to a few politicians. It mentioned her as a famous editor, Andrea had crumpled the paper, then she straightened it and saved it next to the pendant. She could try and make a run for the states, call her mother and tell her to meet her there. Perhaps it was too soon, she'd wait until the dust had settled. It was too early to see if the peace treaty would hold. California and a few western states had said they would fight for their independence. It was a statement with no back up, but Andrea did not want to walk into another war.

She'd wait a few months after all the apartment was better to wait in than the Nevada she had lived on for two years. When she first arrived there after days of walking, and hiding. Tear stained, hungry and still in shock she had slept under a tree. She had hugged Olivia to shelter her from the cold, she did not know how to survive on the street, she never had to learn. She was blinded by the anger and disappointment she felt against Miranda. How could she just send her off, clothes and a child? Give her a few shallow instructions on how to get to a far mountain where the government would not intervene. Despite her anger Andrea had chosen to believe in Miranda and follow those instructions, she had chosen to leave Natalie dead on the ground and flee.

Two months into the peace treaty Andrea went down to the market.

"someone was looking for you" an old vendor wrapped in bright sweaters and the smell of cigar told her.

"For me?" she asked afraid that someone wanted to rob her, or take Olive away from her.

"I didn't say anything" he continued "but be careful."

'Who was it?" she asks

"An elegant, older lady," he answers, "she seemed powerful. We all knew she wasn't from here. She had eyes the color of the ocean and hair the color of the sky right after the dawn breaks. Silver and white."

Her heart sinks and her stomach flutters. Miranda.

"Thank you," she says and scurries off. She feeds Olivia that night. She's scared that Miranda would want something else from her. She had nothing to offer. More than anything she's afraid her heart would break the resolve she's made, that her strength would fail her and all she will want more than anything is to hold her.

She decides to leave, pack up their few belonging and leave. She will call her mother tomorrow and by the time she gets to the border hopefully her mother can scavenger up a plan to bring her home. She'd have to tell he mother about Olivia. She doesn't get the time to explain, Miranda finds her before the night is over.

"It's you again" Andrea spits leaving the door open to the tiny apartment.

"You didn't go where I told you" she says

"I didn't know I had to obey the person who betrayed me."

"Andrea, I had no choice! I had to do it, I could not let us both be wandering around Mexico. I had to make sure my daughters were safe! I hoped you would understand"

"I don't. I don't understand Miranda. There is always a fucking choice! You left, when I needed you the most! You have a knack for doing that. Betraying people, forgetting people, reappearing when you've thought it over and it's convenient." She looks down at Miranda's hand she still has the ring.

"Momma" little Olivia coos and a smile spreads across Miranda's face.

"Wow, she is so big and beautiful."

Andrea nods, "she is."

"You don't have to forgive me Andrea, I would not expect you to. Though I would like it. I just had to find you, and give you back your home. The new government will issue back the seized properties to the owners. There will be foreign troops for a while still but I was given your homes first."

She sets a file and a set of keys on the wood crate that serves as table. She looks tired and older. Like two years have aged her significantly. Her hair is slightly longer, still silver and she's wearing simple slacks and a white sweater. The bottom of her hem is dirty, she's been walking around and her face looks sunburnt.

She gets up giving Olivia a kiss on the forehead. She extends her hand toward Andrea as if to cup her cheek, Andrea flinches and she retracts walking toward the door.

"I'm glad you are safe" she says and puts a hand on the doorknob.

"Miranda?" Andrea asks "are you still with .."

Miranda shakes her head, "I wasn't with him. The governor was killed a few months after and we went separate ways."

"Did you fuck him?" Andrea asks.

Miranda nods ever so slightly. Andrea bites her lips.

"Did you do it while you were with me?"

"Andrea this makes…"

"Did you fuck him, while you were with me?" Andrea repeats louder and angrier.

Miranda nods slightly again.

"Did you get the girls back?" Andrea asks.

For a third time Miranda nods. They are waiting at the hotel.

"Where are you going?"

"Home, I suppose. Soon as soon as the border is officially opened."

"Good luck" Andrea says still sitting down on the flimsy plastic chair, Olivia is now on her lap playing with a loose end of her dress.

"You know, the girls are 22. The same age at which I met you. They remind me so much of you. Even after all they have seen recently their eyes sparkle when talk about fairness and hope. I see you in them. I hope they turn out like you, and not like me…. They asked about you. I told them the truth. They didn't talk to me for days. I hope once everything is settled you can keep in touch with them. They like you Andrea" she says sadness dripping from every word she had said.

Andrea makes a shrug and Miranda takes that as a cue to leave. Andrea pages through the papers. Tears stream down again. She can go home. She takes Olivia the following day and they take a bus home. To the city, the grand sky scrapers and the Aztec ruins. Her house is the same. Seems like no one lived here, a few windows are broken and a lot of cleaning must be made but she will hire someone for that. She can do that now. She hires Maria to help her clean the house, and Rodrigo her husband to do minor repairs. They change the dark green carpet and roll in beige one, they take the wallpaper off and paint all the walls grey and pearl. They bring in new furniture and make a nursery for Olivia and amidst all of the changes she phones Miranda still at the same hotel and tells her she'd love to have the twins over for dinner.

Miranda was right, they remind her of herself and Natalie. It was like seeing their younger versions. Cassidy works for the Human Rights Coalition. She wants to head over to the headquarters in New York and keep working with them. Caroline wants to become a doctor and do a few years doing humanitarian work before settling in back in Germany.

"won't that break your mother's heart?" she asks

"She's used to being alone," is all Caroline says and Andrea doesn't want to go deeper.

"Will you ever forgive her?" Cassidy asks as they are leaving the house. Rodrigo would drive them back to the hotel.

"I don't know Cass, I have to forgive myself first. What we lived was horrible. I saw my best friend die before my eyes."

"We know, we know it was the same day mom left" Caroline speaks up, "she wants to come see Olivia before we leave in the next month but she wasn't sure if it was something you would agree to"

Andrea hesitates. She remembers that night, Miranda handing the child of to her.

"I don't think that would be a good idea" Andrea murmurs.

"Come on Andy, we know it was mom's fault. We know how much she hurt you, but she just wants to see Olivia."

"Fine, Wednesday for lunch. She can come"

"Thank you" they both mouth and walk off to the car.

Andrea wasn't there when Miranda arrived, it broke the older woman's heart. She deserved it, she deserved that and more. She stayed for about an hour and left. She took the house in, it looked even more splendid than she remembered. In the hallway that led to the studio new photographs had been hung, there were some from Andrea's childhood, a few with Natalie and at the end there were a few that had been taken from their time here in the house. Andrea and Miranda laughing at something someone not visible in the picture now, there was one of them at the ambassador's gala, and one she remembers vividly, Natalie had taken it in the Plaza they are holding hands. It is in that moment she realizes both women will never love anyone else.

Andrea knows it too, when she gets home and can still smell Miranda's perfume. She had spent the day at an architect's office. She's going to rebuilt the hacienda, back to the days she remembers when she used to spend summers there. She wants Olivia to see it, to love the culture. Next to the child's crib is a handwritten note.

"My dear Andrea,

I understand you don't want to see me. That I have broken your heart. I know that you let down your walls for me, that you left your family's beliefs aside, that you gave me your complete trust as I gave you mine.

I was the one that broke it.

Like I always do.

There are no amounts of apologies that can ever undo that night, or all the cold lonely nights you spent after. And more than anything there is no way I can undo the betrayal.

The only thing I know is that we will never love anyone else, for good or for bad. We are soul mates, and we are bound by a promise we made under the stars and sealed with two rings.

Marriages had never meant much to me before you, but during all those times I spent away from you. I wanted solely to marry you and go home.

I hope time will make you forgive me.

With all my love,

Miranda

Andrea reads the letter twice. She knows Miranda is right. She will never love anyone else. She knows that she will love the editor for as long as she lives. Perhaps she's meant to forgive her again, be the savior for the Ice Queen. She hated betrayal. She had felt it first with Henry her first fiancée and she had broken the engagement off. The difference is she didn't love him. No, not the way she loved Miranda.

"Miranda,

I make no promises, but I do have something that belongs to you. Something I was supposed to give you a long time ago. Won't you join me for dinner. Go to the restaurant by the lake in Chapultepec at 7.

A."

She shows up early, the reservation was under Nieto.

"Andrea, you look lovely as always" Miranda says as she sits down.

Andrea has cut her hair, and she has curled it around her face. She always had an affinity for vintage movies and Ingrid Bergman and that is what he hair looks like. Ingrid Bergman in Casa Blanca. Miranda on the other hands looks toned down. She's only wearing an all-black pants and sweater combination and a thin red belt. Her hair is almost at her shoulder, straightened and styled voluminously and there is barely any makeup on her face. She looks tired, sad and tired.

"I can't say this dinner was expected,"

Andrea smirks, "this few last years have been unexpected."

Miranda gives a dry chuckle and nods.

"I have something for you," Andrea says as she puts a neat white box in the middle of the table.

"I thought that was figurative speech" Miranda murmurs and carefully grabs the box.

"I was going to give it to you once I got to New York to spend that month there, remember?" Andrea asks.

"How could I forget,"

"I bought it that same day the bombs hit LA" she pauses.

"It's beautiful, Andrea" Miranda whispers her breath caught as she admires the pendants hanging from the silver chain.

"Are you sure you want me to have it? It meant something so vastly different then," she stops herself and looks up.

"I am sure Miranda, I once told you we were meant for something grand, remember?"

Again, the silver haired editor nods.

The wine arrives, the appetizers and the entrees. Andrea has ordered sole again, Miranda has ordered steak and asparagus.

"This dinner seems like that same dinner we had remember? I said that it was our last dinner, you said it wouldn't be."

Andrea smiles and sips her wine.

"I wish you would say the same now" Miranda casts a look up at her diner companion and quickly looks down, 'but I guess you won't."

"I am having the Hacienda redone, we're starting this Thursday. We're installing modern feeders and water access for horse stables. I want Olivia to learn to ride, and I'm repainting everything of course. We're doing some insulation, I can't believe how cold it got there!"

"Wow, that's fantastic"

Andrea looks up and smiles, "you're accent."

Miranda laughs.

"Anyway, we're going to plant tulips and roses and make it an organic flower farm. With time of course, the region needs to rebuild. It is still not free of corruption but it is better than it was before," the brunette smiles, "I was wondering if you wanted to come. We're having a ground- breaking ceremony."

"I would like to. Can I bring the girls?" Miranda asks.

"Of course," she answers.

They talk about many things that night. Mostly politics and the house rebuilding and going back to work. The following Thursday Miranda shows up at the Hacienda with her daughters in tow. She hands Andrea a think velvet box. Inside the box is an emerald necklace. It isn't ostentatious, it is a sole emerald wrapped in uneven gold wire and hanging from a thin gold chain.

"I didn't forget," she leans in and whispers, "happy birthday Andrea."

Andrea hurries to wipe the rampart tears that were coming down.

"Do you want to do the champagne toast after the shovel digging?" Caroline asks

Andrea nods still trying to dry the tears and walks off to give directions.

The small ceremony runs deep into the night, "you shouldn't drive home this late"

"I don't want to impose" Miranda says.

"You would never, you're still my fiancée I think, right?" Andrea jokes and Miranda laughs.

"I believe so, neither of us has officially said otherwise." They both look down to their rings and smile.

"then you'll be family for tonight"

Miranda nods, "I'll sleep downstairs."

"I … okay" Andrea doubts herself and shows the girls the rooms. Another guest, someone she works with in the Human Rights Coalition has also stayed the night and everyone else lives nearby or had left earlier.

When everyone is asleep, Andrea knocks and opens the door. Miranda is sitting on the edge of the bed staring at the window.

"I brought you more blankets, it gets very chilly this time of year," she whispers.

"thank you" Miranda husks and twirls around to face Andrea, "do you hate me?"

"I could never hate you Miranda, I was angry and broken. But hate? I could never feel hate for you. I will love you till the end of my days, despite my family, despite you."

Miranda chuckles dryly, "would you still marry me if I asked?"

Andrea nods and feels the older woman take her hand. They stay like that for a long time. Then someone moves closer, neither remembers who, it simply was done. For they had always been a continuation of the other, since that frosty morning at Elias Clarke. Miranda has desperately wanted to get to know that unfashionable girl, and Andrea had from the first moment read Miranda's thoughts. It was as if they knew each other from before, in some other life past. They were meant to always be lovers, over and over and over. In a thousand worlds, in a thousand eras they would find each other. They would always find each other.

It wasn't public, they got married in the back garden of Andrea's city house. Only the twins, Nigel and the judge were present. Olivia was the flower girl. They didn't need anything else and Miranda postponed her return to the states until Andrea finished remodeling the country house.

It took longer than anticipated, five long months to make the soil good enough for the flowers she wanted to plant and build the stables. They went to horse shows and bought two purebred stallions. They restructured the main house too, making sure that it was stable enough and building an extra wing for the guests and offices. To kill the time Andrea helped Cass out with the Human Rights Campaigns, it was her way of giving back to the indigenous people who in a way had saved her during those two harsh years. From outside and in her little perfect world that had been granted it looked like the war had been resolved perfectly. Wrapped in a bow and fixed, the truth is that the country was still in shambles. The governmental structures were weak and vulnerable, it had lost millions trying to seize and return property within a short span of time, many investors and companies had pulled out during the height of the violence and the embassies were barely trusting again.

"Have you talked to anyone in the states about practicing law again?" Miranda asked a few weeks after the remodeling had been done. Cass and Caro were talking of departing soon, school and humanitarian work occupying their mind.

"I haven't really," she said tentatively.

"Andrea?"

"Mhh"

"I have to go soon, it's okay if you want to take time off. You can come with us to New York. Cass will love having you there to help, I will love having you there."

Andrea nods absentmindedly running her fingers through Olivia's sleeping figure.

"Yeah, I think time off will be good" she blinks, "when are you leaving?"

"Whenever you want."

They pack everything the following day. She dismisses the help, they cover everything with white sheets and packing boxes just like they found it six years ago. She puts the crucifix back on the corner of the night table. What would Oliva Nieto think of all this? Of the mess she's made with her life? She'd love little Olivia Rose Aster Nieto as she had decided to officially name her. She would take her little hand like she used to do with her. She would be proud of Andrea's strength to face the world, to fight tooth and nail She would love that she was home, but of Miranda? She wouldn't like it. She'd love Miranda, everyone admired Miranda, but she would not agree with their marriage. It would make her sad.

The drive to the airport is as everything in this city long and plagued with traffic. The airport is on the other side of the city. Miranda holds her hand the whole ride, as the drive past the old buildings painted over tenths of times, past the beggars on the streets, the little kids face dirty and eyes in pain. She holds her hand through the long street art walls that cry out for the disappearance of their family members, of their kids. They drive past the tents pitched on the corners of the streets, clothes airing out in lines and smoke of something cooking. They drive past the national flag undulating in by the army base, they drive past Mexico as, "I wish you love," plays soft jazz notes in the background of the scenes.

"I wish you bluebirds in the Spring To give your heart a song to sing," past the palm trees still lining Reforma and the Angel of Independence.

"My breaking heart and I agree That you and I could never be," past the bushes outside the airport gates.

"We're here," the driver announces leaving both women outside the private entrance to International departures. There are journalists and reports that weren't expected. Miranda looks at Andrea, "I didn't know"

"It's okay," Andrea murmurs she pulls in Miranda for a long kiss, breathtaking and agonizing. It was as she wanted in that last -minute kiss, inside a black tinted Cadillac to say everything Miranda already knew.

Miranda smiles at her younger lover, the girls have already climbed the stairs aided by the bodyguards and security. How easy it was to slip back into what her life had been, how natural it came to all of them.

"Caroline! Cassidy! What are you doing here? What do you think of your mothers wedding? Any comments on the pre-liberty involvement with the carterls?"

The twins shake their heads and climb quickly.

Miranda exits next aided again by the security team and the chauffeur who puts the suitcases in the care of the attendant.

"Miranda, Miranda! Miranda! Unas palabras! A few words! How has your stay in Mexico been? Did you run away? How do you feel about the loss of life at Elias? Did you know before? Miranda! A smile! What of your new wife? Have you been with her all this time? Andrea Sachs!" Miranda smiles like she always does, sunglasses on, dark Armani dress coat wrapped firmly around her and beige Narcisso Rodrigues palazzo underneath. She looks like she always does, like a goddess that Venus would be jealous of.

Andrea looks beautiful too but she can't walk behind Miranda. She has gotten out of the car, Miranda is distracted for a moment then she watches it happen. Paris right before her eyes.

The cameras keep flashing, "Miranda! Donde esta Andy! Where is Andrea? Is she coming with you? Can you show us the ring? Will you go back to Elias Clarke? Miranda did you get involve with the mafia?"

"Good-bye, no use leading with our chins / This is where our story ends / Never lovers, ever friends / Good-bye, let our hearts call it a day / But before you walk away" tears pooled in her eyes.

Miranda fakes a smile and turns around seeing Andrea get on the car and leave. Maybe it was never meant to be, but it still hurts like hell.

Amidst all the flashes and clamor she could hear the breaking of her heart.

Yes, Miranda love her more than any other silly person in the world.

Perhaps she's right to walk away, Miranda would hurt her again, that's what she would do and the contents of how the Dragon Lady drove away yet another lover would spill over Page Six. No, she would not try again. She had already tried, she wouldn't force Andrea. She would watch her from afar, love her from afar, let her be.


	8. Epilogue

Epilogue

"Of the record, did you love her?" Cassidy asks. They are sitting at the UN offices in Switzerland.

Andrea had been invited as a guest for her humanitarian work in Mexico for the past 25 years.

"I did," she explains, "I loved her more than anything in the world. She was the only person I ever loved, Cass."

"You never came back, you left her on the airport stairs and never came back" Cassidy's voice breaks.

"Cass, this isn't the best place for this talk. Let's finish the interview. We'll get dinner, Olivia is arriving later today you can see her too."

Cass nods and they mumble through a few more questions about what helping the indigenous people has meant to her, about giving up her promising law career meant and about her grandmother and how proud she would be.

Andrea leaves knowing she will have to answer Cass for so much. She left the love of her life standing at the airport in Mexico City 25 years ago. She could not leave, she could not go back to lead the same life she was leading after the world had been uprooted and gardened again. Yet, she could not make Miranda stay in Mexico, Miranda would have done it. She would have done it out of guilt and love and loyalty. She would have done it but it would have made her miserable, so Andrea left. Part to free Miranda and part to free herself. If she was honest she would say she visited her grandmothers tomb that day, she and Olivia sat there on the wooden bench of the quiet church and stared. They stared at the family name, both her grandparents and her aunt were buried there, ashes to ashes. Andrea could not have gone to the states and faced everyone. She wasn't as strong as Miranda. She never had been. She didn't know how to fight back, she didn't know how to shed the past.

She had sent Miranda adoption papers for Olivia, and a contract dictating parental custody. Miranda had signed them all, no questions, no letters. They always talked through their lawyer as if afraid that hearing each other would entice the breakdown they were both holding. Every February Miranda would send Andrea a Cartier jewel. The first time it said

'to the love of my life,

M'

that was the only time. After that they always arrived unsigned and without a note. They didn't need one. Andrea always sent Miranda white roses every September and a Gucci scarf.

"She left you everything, you know?" Cass says as they sit down for dinner.

Andrea nods.

"You were still her wife."

"I know"

"You haven't claimed it." Cass reproaches.

"I don't want to," she says, "I am going to give it all to Olivia and you two"

Cass nods, "she left you the house in the Hamptons. She wants you go there."

"I never came back, but she knew I loved her. I gave her Olivia and.."

"A scarf every birthday, I know. She would wear it all the time. 22 of them. She had 22"

"Cass, I had to stay" Andrea's voice cracks.

She had to help her country, living out in the Nevada for two years changed her life. Her perspective of poverty, of indigenous people, or why she was put on this Earth. She had the means, her grandmothers' state, she had Olivia's inheritance.

"Mom was never the same, she retired two years later"

"I know"

"She bought a house in California"

"I know"

"Why Andrea?"

"We weren't meant to be Cass, your mom and I"

"She always said that. She said you two were meant for something great, even if it wasn't each other. I guess you two did prove that point. She started a fashion brand after that and you well you were a fucking hero."

"Don't say it like that," Andrea whispers. That sentence was hers. It was the sentence she used at the restaurant back in Chicago.

"you never kept in touch with us. It … I was hurt," Cass confesses.

"I should have"

"We only knew what Olivia told us every winter and every summer"

"She loved Miranda so much, she was her second mother"

Cass nods, Olivia arrives.  
"I'm sorry for being late, the taxi was lost"

They catch up, they all catch up for 25 years lost and so much unsaid in between. Cass kept working for the Human Rights coalition for years, until a 3 years ago when she moved to the UN headquarters after her mother died. Andrea attended the funeral with Olivia but did not stay. She walked away as soon as the casket was lowered. It didn't matter anymore. What if people judged, the only person that mattered wasn't' there anymore. She had not been in the mood to socialize with designers and press.

Caroline ended up leaving medical school after the second year and finishing as a fashion major. She followed her mother's steps and now worked with Runway Britain. Olivia turned out to be the doctor, in true Aster tradition she studied at USC, she had sold her mother's house in Newport and often visited Miranda in her years there. Andrea, well she had become a fucking hero and as most heroes always are, she herself was broken.

~ months later

Andrea had enacted the will. She had accepted Miranda's state. She felt imprisoned by it all. She quickly turned everything over to the twins. Even though Miranda had provided for both of them, she gave them everything else. The townhome, the house in England and all the money. She gave the house in California to Olivia and she kept the one in the Hamptons. They had been so happy here, for a few days the world had quieted around them. Miranda had laughed more than she ever heard her laugh. This was their last time together in New York. The house was quiet now, full of shadows and memories. The pool was dry, and leaves fell over it. The tears fell and she didn't bother to wipe them away. This had been paradise. Andrea climbed the stairs slowly and walked into the master bedroom. When she enacted the inheritance she had been given something else. Something that she had not brought herself to open until this moment.

'My darling Andrea,

If I know you well, you're reading this in the beach house. The one in the Hamptons, the one where we were so happy. Perhaps you're sitting in the patio or my bedroom. Whatever you do, and where ever life takes you in the years to follow I want you to keep this house. Keep this house always, it meant the world to me. To be here with you, to be so free and have your whole heart,"

Andrea is crying now, tears roll down quietly. She can hear Miranda's quiet voice. She can see her, head tilted back smiling.

"I won't reproach you the years we have spent apart. It wasn't our fault, they simply weren't meant to be. We weren't meant to be. All our moments together have stuck with me, the good and the bad but there was one moment that seemed to dictate out fate. That moment at the Abergaire in Chicago when you said, 'we were meant for something grand, even if it wasn't each other'. We were meant for so many grand things, we were meant to save each other when the world was falling apart around us. I owe you my life, you saved me with that one phone call, you saved me in every way someone can be saved.

I've watched your career from afar, you make me proud. I insist that you are a better person than I ever was. I see how you've raised Olivia, she tells me all the lessons you give her, Natalie would be proud. She would be proud you've shared her with me. I see her, and I see you. I see your idealism, your hope, your kindness. She's going to make a great doctor, I tell her that all the time. She tells me, that you love me. That you keep our wedding picture over the piano, with the tulips. She tells me that it conflicts you, our love and faith. She tells me you never took your ring of, I still have mine. I'll have it till the day I die. Andrea, marrying you was the one sane decision I took in my life, and I am glad you agreed, even if it was short lived. Being your wife was the greatest accomplishment of my life, perhaps second only to being a mother.

Don't cry. If I know you well, you're crying"

Andrea laughs and dries the tears from her eyes. Steve had almost been right. With time, she had quieted the heartbreak, her humanitarian work kept her busy and raising Olivia had been a full time job. Pain had dulled. But it had never healed, she had never been reckless again. Here reading Miranda's letter, she knew her heart had never healed and it hurt with the same intensity it had all those years ago.

"I hope you fix this house, put water in the pool and make the plants beautiful again. Like you did with the hacienda and the city house. I hope you come here often, with Olivia. I hope you two have cocktail parties in the pool, maybe have Cass and Caro over. I hope you're happy Andrea. All I ever wanted was for you to be happy."

Andrea feels something else in the envelope, the ring. The emerald ring. Unordinary.

"I could write so much more. I could write things I've been wanting to tell you for 20 years. Reproach you for leaving me in a hoard of paparazzi twice! And without answers to tell them! I want to regale you with tales of Runway, you'd laugh at some of them. And Nigel's face when I told him I was retiring two years after returning. I want to tell you about starting a fashion brand on the west coast, a beach inspired brand, and the aid of all three Priestly children. I officially adopted Olivia so, she's a Priestly too and so are you. I hope you use your last name someday. I want to tell you about writing the last Editors Page, and how I signed it with both our last names. You would enjoy the fight with Irv, over that. I want to tell you how much I've missed you every single day for the last 20 years. And I want to thank you for the flowers and the scarfs, they meant the world to me. I looked forward to turning one year older because of you.

Andrea the years are drawing to an end for me. The doctors have diagnosed stage four something. I have decided to keep it a secret. I would not want you to come see me out of duty. I want you to remember me the glamorous, powerful editor that was madly in love with you. I want you to remember every time I kissed you and made love to you, I want you to remember I loved you more than anyone else in the world.

That's all, my dearest Andy.

I wish you the best future. I won't see you become even grander, and help more people. I won't see you make those cocktail parties, or wear the ring anymore. I won't ever see your beautiful chocolate eyes, or walk Olivia down the aisle if she finds true love. I won't get to tell you in person that I love you.

I love you. I always have. I always will.

All my love,

Miranda Priestly-Sachs

The letter ends with an elaborate signature and Andrea sits there crying despite the orders the letter gives not to do so. People looking from outside could say that Andrea was unfair in leaving Miranda, that she wasn't brave enough. That she was full of antiquated ideas not feasible in a modern world. Others would say she had not forgiven Miranda fully and that it was Miranda's fault for betraying Andrea. Neither would be right. Andrea had learned one thing in all the war years, to forgive. She had forgiven Miranda because she loved her, and she had left her because war had also taught her faith was real, and god in the most obscure of days will shine a light.

~ two years later

"Mom! I have the cocktails ready! Is Caroline and the boys here yet?" Olivia yells from the pool.

She's holding a martini in one hand and bottle of something in the other.

"She texted me, they'll be here in a few minutes," Cass said.

Cass had never married but Caroline had married twice and had three rambunctious boys with her second husband of 8 years.

Olivia was dating Ronald, a doctor at the hospital in California she worked with.

She had recently moved to California.

"I'm here, I'm here and oh my God Andy, congratulations!" she exclaims

"We're not talking about it, it's only a nomination," she blushes.

"Here, Get a drink," Olivia orders and they all do.

"what are we toasting to?" Cass asks.

Olivia is about to say her mother has been nominated for a Nobel peace prize but Andrea interrupts.

"We're celebrating great women today and family. We're celebrating my grandmother, and Natalie,' she turns to Olivia who nods, "and Cass for getting a promotion at the UN and Caroline for moving to French Runway and being here in this house, that I finally had the time to make beautiful again! We're celebrating that I, Andrea Marie Priestly-Sachs got nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize," she stops when everyone claps.

"You changed it?" Cass and Olivia ask in unison.

"Officially" she smiles referring to her combined last name.

"Mom would have been so happy"

Andrea nods, Life often changes our paths. It challenges us, to decide what is more important. It makes us choose between family and love, hope and loyalty, patriotism and rationale. Life is not a kind mistress, to not hurt those we love we often sacrifice love itself. To not betray memories and promises we break our own heart. To not risk hell, we abandon heaven. Andrea wasn't a stranger to the irony of life. As a teen-ager she had told her mother she wanted an romance worthy of the greatest love story, an on screen romance that would fill the imagination of many and would end in tragic music and tears for those watching. She wanted a romance written off as fiction, Arthur and Isoldes, Romeo and Juliet, Carol and Therese, Jack and Rose, Anna Karenina and Count Vronsky. She had definitely gotten it, life had given her more than she had bargained for. Life is mysterious like that.

"And most of all," Andrea continues raising her glass, "we're celebrating Miranda"

Cheers!


	9. Alternate Ending

Caroline knocked on her mother's room and entered a second after, "are you ready for dinner mom?"

Miranda tried to dry the tears but she wasn't quick enough nor was the eyeliner forgiving enough to not show.

"Are you crying?" Caroline asks though she knows the answer. Olivia had left a few days earlier and her mother always cried after. They only saw Olivia every summer, ever since Andrea had left them on the airport stairs. A few weeks later adoption papers stating both women as guardians had arrived, yet the clause was that Andrea would keep the child and Miranda would only be allowed summers. The editor never contested the rights, in fact the two women had not spoken. The whole process was carried on by a Chicago law firm and it had been a ritual since then for Olivia to come every summer.

The truth is the twins had never seen their mother change so much after a breakup, they had never seen her so devastated, so reserved, so pensive. None of her other marriages had mattered, the previous husbands had been accessories to keep and discard along with a spread for Spring or Fall. The two sisters knew it and yet they did not dare to intervene.

"Why don't you call her?" They had asked multiple times.

Miranda always shook her head, "I can't. I was the one that hurt her."

"I don't think Andrea left because of that, mom you love her!"

"Sometimes love is letting go Bobbsey sometimes it is giving her space and time'"

"It's been five years," they would argue.

"It can be a lifetime for a broken heart to heal," Miranda would answer and gets up shooing her daughters out. Tonight, had been no different.

"Is she coming?" Cass asks at the foot of the stairs.

"She said she would in a minute. Tell Alma to get dinner set."

"Is she crying again?" the younger sister of a few minutes asks.

Caroline nods. The two young women are here on their weekly visit to their mother. They never thought they would worry about her, the dragon lady but they do. The war changed her, it made her humbler and sadder but loosing Andrea had made her vulnerable in a way neither twin is sure their mother ever had been.

~ Another Cartier gift arrived for Andrea. They always arrived on the same day of her birthday, every February. They were special commission Andrea knew because she had taken the first two to the Cartier store down in Polanco. The attendant had looked confused at first, then the manager had intervened.

"A commission from Mrs. Priestly-Sachs," she had paused looked very nervous, "Miranda Priestly that is all I can see here, was there something wrong with them?"

Andrea had shaken her head and assured the nervous manager that everything was perfect.

"Miranda's Office," the other voice at the end of the line had said. Andrea didn't answer, she wasn't sure why she called. She had never replied to the gifts. It was a mutual understanding. She got jewels and in return sent a Gucci scarf and Atelier chocolates from the little store down Plaza Santa Fe, Miranda had liked. She sent them every September on her wife's birthday.

"I would like to talk to Miranda," she says demurely. She knows the assistant is probably smirking wondering who this person thinks she is.

"May I ask who this is?"

"Tell her it's her wife," Andrea answers. She doesn't know why she said that, she has never said that to anyone. She could have said Andrea Sachs, or Andrea but no she had said wife. It felt strange in her mouth, like dried walnuts, like wine tannins, like speaking up in class when you're unsure of the answer.

The assistant put her on hold.

"Miranda?" the thin blond girl dressed in Vera Wang and Dolce had asked.

Miranda had turned as always annoyed by being interrupted in her talk with Nigel. She had glared at the young assistant, "I don't remember calling you."

"Um... you have a call," she said.

"Take a message," Nigel jumped to intervene quickly.

"She said it was your wife," the girl answered into immediate silence.

Miranda waved her hands and whispers, "I'll take it you may leave."

Nigel left with her, closing the door behind.

"Miranda is married?" the young assistant asked.

"Oh for Pete's sake, you won't last the week," he deadpanned and walked over to his office.

"Andrea?" Miranda answered tentatively. There was soft silence and she answered.

"Miranda, hi," it was soft, as if Andrea herself was not expecting to hear her own voice, there was a breath after it, velvet and lace.

"Is everything okay?" Miranda asks because the only reason she can think of for Andrea to call is that something has happened to her or Olivia.

"Yes.. yes …I ..I just .. I wante.. I got your gift," she finally stutters out.

Calling Miranda had not been a whim, it had been a carefully crafted thought. She had wanted to for months, years. She had dialed a lot of times never finishing the last number.

"Oh," Miranda breathes into the phone. She sits down and rests her elbows on the desk, she has tears at bay, her breath hitches and as much as she tells herself that she should not. She hopes. She hopes that Andrea says she misses her, that she still loves her. She hopes so much. She should not.

"I hope you liked it," Miranda says after beats of silence go by.

"I did. I always do. It's beautiful," Andrea answers. The line is plagued by silence.

"Well, that was it," Andrea sais again. Miranda wants to stop her, to tell her she needs her, she wants to ask if she still loves her but she doesn't. She dries the tears that are seamlessly falling with her free hand and steadies her voice.

"Oh, you don't have to thank me. Happy Birthday Andrea," she says.

"I have to go," the younger woman explains hoping that Miranda stops her. She does not.

"I understand."

"Goodbye," Andrea whispers.

"Andrea!" Miranda desperately speaks into the phone.

"Yes?" Andrea answers the same despair flinging from her cracked voice.

"you can always call me home, or directly, you know that right?"

"yes of course," Andrea answers relieved and deflated at the same time.

"Cancel the rest of my day," she tells the assistant standing outside the door, "have Roy bring my keys. I want to drive."

The rush feels like a whirlwind, she is met with her bag, coat and car keys.

She drives to the Hamptons, to her beach house. She drives alone, she drives crying. She wants to know why Andrea had called, she wants to call her back and say so much. She wants to. She wants to, but she can't. She promised she'd let the young woman be. That she would not pull her back ever again. She promised, she repeats to herself as she pours whiskey after whiskey. She's going to have a headache tomorrow it does not matter, she wants to forget. She wants to forget that day and the following morning when she blacks out again.

The phone call is not the only surprise that years brings. Oliva asks Andrea to let her spend Christmas vacation with Miranda. It breaks Andrea's heart. She always wondered what her grandmother had felt when she had been taken away, now she knew.

"Of course! Darling," she answers with the best smile she can muster. She sends Oliva off with well wishes and gifts for everyone. She takes her to the same airport at the other edge of city, large metal birds flanking in and out roaring as they go. She waves at the gate and musters all her strength to not cry.

She ends up having Christmas dinner with her mother who she barely speaks to, who has flown down uninvited and who has insisted they cook turkey even though it's only two of them. She ends up drinking too much, too early and wishing she could skip the holiday altogether. Christmas used to be her favorite holiday, full of wonder and hope. Andrea used to believe in her grandmother's arms that magic existed, that the world got kinder, that the star of Bethlehem guided them all. Growing up took all that away, the days got busy, sad, angry and expensive. Olivia had given her hope again, the chance to make someone else believe Christmas was beautiful and magical, take her to midnight mass, the red flowers and the incense imprinting in their memories.

Oliva calls to her surprise before midnight, "mom?"

"Darling! How are you? Are you having fun?" she asks.

She can hear the commotion of a party, she was sure Miranda had pulled out all the stops for their 8-year-old daughter, she was sure that there was music, and wonder and trees as tall as Olivia could imagine.

"Yes, Miranda had seats for the Carnegie Hall concert and we're going shopping tomorrow!"

"Oh, Olie I'm so glad," she says the childhood moniker she rarely used coming back. She had learned one thing about names from Miranda there was nothing more beautiful than using someone's full name.

"I miss you mom, Feliz Navidad, do you want to wish Miranda a Merry Christmas," the child asks.

"Wish everyone one for me okay?" she answers.  
"I can go find Miranda?"

"No! no! no, just do it for me. Now go have fun."

"Okay mom!" the child hangs up and Miranda waits for her to do so. She was listening onto the call. She had hoped that Andrea would say yes, that she wanted to talk to her. She had hoped so since the phone call earlier that year, but Andrea had not called. The year had passed on quietly, the scarf had arrived, Olivia had called about the visit and yet Andrea had never called again. The twins insisted again, but Miranda was adamant, she would not corner Andrea. She would never try again.

'I don't know how you let Olivia go with that woman!" her mother had yelled from the kitchen.

"Mom, Miranda is a close member of the family," Andrea stuttered. Her mother knew, she knew about them, about Mexico, about the wedding. The press had hinted, the press had said, her mother had no doubt read something. They never talked about it, she never asked. The truth is her mother had never physically seen them get married, she had never seen them together and she choose to tell herself that it had not happened.

"It's not healthy for Olivia, what is she going to think? That you two are somewhat related?"

"Mother, Oliva knows that Miranda cares for her. I don't want to talk about it."

"Cares for her, my is that what we call it now? Your father would be so disappointed in you. What you and that editor did was a sin," her mother keeps yelling from the kitchen. She is washing the dishes, even though Andrea has insisted that Maria can do it. Maria has insisted she could do, but Mrs. Sachs has still refused to let anyone help.

"I don't want to talk about it," Andrea repeats.

"That woman was bad news, always since you went to New York."

"Mom! Stop it, not tonight! I don't want to fucking talk about it," she yells standing in the kitchen. Maria is picking up the plates, Maria remembers Miranda. She remembers the war, she remembers when Andrea came home from the airport, four-year old Olivia in her arms. Maria remembers the days it took for Andrea to stop crying, the time it took to pull herself together. Maria was the only friend Andrea had left, the only one that sat down with a bottle of tequila and listened to Andrea's moral dilemma.

"I'm going to bed. Maria go home, tomorrow we'll have lunch."

"Oh no, señora no quiero molestar," the dark -haired maid said.

"Maria, you are my friend perhaps more welcomed than my mother," Andrea said and walked off to bed, leaving the poor woman with a sobbing Anastasia Sachs and pile of clean dishes and food.

While Miranda and Andrea fought their own demons, their morals and the self-promises, Olivia was growing up in a curious world. A world full of classmates that knew who she was related to, who asked about her summers with the most fashionable woman in the world and who asked about Andrea and her humanitarian causes. A world that made her at a week shy of 13 ask about her past.

"Mom?"

"Yes, darling," Andrea looked up from the deep cherry desk in the study. Her glasses perched on the edge of her nose and her face illuminated by the light of her screen.

"I want you to tell me about mom," the young child stated. She had Natalie's eyes, green and gray, bubbling over with spark and cheerfulness. Her hair that had been blond like her mother's was now a dark shade of tan and her apple shaped face had high cheekbones. She barely resembled her mother, except for the eyes the eyes had her soul.

"You know everything about her honey," Andrea tosses non-challantly.

"I want to know where she's buried?"

"I have already told you," Andrea says looking back at her screen.

"That you don't remember," the child interrupts, "but you're lying. You have to know. Where is she mom? And who is my father? Why don't you ever talk about him? Why are you and Miranda apart? I know you are more than friends."

"Darling, you're too young for all of this, mommy has work," Andrea usually does not dismiss her daughter like that, but she's not in the mood. She feels like she's being ambushed and she has no answers, she doesn't like the feeling.

"No! I'm not. I'm 13 I know I'm not an adult, but I am old enough. I deserve to know. Mom?"

Andrea looks up, she knows she's lost the battle.

"You and Miranda are married. I'm not dumb, she has a picture. I looked it up. I looked up old articles about the war, and there is mention of you and her," the child walks over to sit facing her mother.

"Fine, if you want to know I'll tell you…." She pauses, she has always known she'd have to at some point explain. "The war was a horrible experience. We ran away, your mother and I. We were the best of friends, she was like a sister to me. You already know we met in college. Well Miranda came too, we were … we had something that was starting. I cared deeply for her and I wanted her to be safe. Caroline and Cassidy were in Europe with their father and so we ran to the only place I felt safe, here. While we were here, the US was falling apart, violence started to follow us here. Those were scary times, your mother got pregnant with you."

"Who was my dad? Was he a bad man?"

"No, he was kind and he cared for your mother. The war took him back to his country. He didn't know your mom was expecting you," Andrea hides the truth, she doesn't see a point in telling Olivia her father was married. She would take that secret to the grave.

"The city got to insecure after some time and with Natalie having you we wanted somewhere safer and so we went to live in the hacienda."

The child nods, she's listening, she's absorbing ever word her chocolate eyed mother speaks.

"Unfortunately, the cartels made up of bad people rose up there too, and the violence reached us there, they stole the lands from the owners with guns and bombs. That was the moment your mother died. She was protecting you, she was alone in the farm that day. I had gone to the market," she stops.

"And Miranda?"

"She was not there either, when I got back your mom had been hurt. She made me promise I would take care of you. She entrusted the most precious thing in her life to me, and I did everything I could to save you. I had to flee to save you. I had to leave," she knows this has been the truth she has been hiding.

"So… you left mom there? Is that why you don't know where she is? You left her there for the vultures? She rotted away? Or is she buried with some other 20 people in a common grave? How could you?"

"Olivia, I had to go! They were coming for us, if I had stayed we would have died, they would have killed me and you and your mother would not have wanted that. She would have done the same to save you. You would not understand," she explains.

"What? What would I not understand?"

She sees herself standing at the hacienda yelling the same words at Miranda.

"And Miranda?" the child asks.

"She … she had to make sure her own daughters were safe."

"She wasn't there?"

Andrea shakes her head.

"She betrayed us. It is true then. That she went with the cartels?" the child asks.

"No, Miranda never hurt anyone … she was making sure her children would be safe. The war made us do things we would never consider today, that we didn't think we were capable of."

"Is that why you married her? And left her?" the child asks again sarcastically.

Andrea knows this can possibly be easy to comprehend for a teen. She can't come to terms with it herself.

"No, I left her because my family did not approve of us. I left her because my own moral compass was torn. But Olivia I have never doubted that Miranda is a good person and she loves you immensely."

"I can't believe both of you," Olivia spits.

"Oliva there is so much I can't explain, because even for us grown-ups it's hard to explain. There is so many people to please, so many rules and expectations to come to terms with. I know a few things for sure though. Your mom meant the world to me and she trusted Miranda and I to take care of you. She believed we were good people and she would have done the same thing I did to save you. I know Miranda is a good person, I never would have forgiven her if I didn't think so. I know she never would hurt anyone willingly. I know she loves you the same or more than I do."

The child nods, "I want to go to boarding school. I hate you both."

The words wash over her like cold water. She had hoped that this conversation would happen later in life, that older Oliva would understand.

"Darling," Andrea tries, she tries to reconcile with her daughter. She tries to explain. In the end she agrees, because she too believes that maybe Olivia just needs space.

In the winter, she flies out to New Hampshire, and when the headmistress tells her that her daughter does not want to see her she almost loses her calm.

"Miss Sachs, I'm so sorry Olivia refuses to see you," there is a pause Frances M. the headmistress to the all girl's boarding school that charges per year more than four years of college cost smiles, "we can give you the key to her room?"

Andrea shakes her head, "No it's okay. I will try again later."

In the summer, it is Miranda who tries to the same result. "Miss Priestly, Oliva does not want to see you. Miss Sachs… your wife?" the headmistress asks.

Miranda nods, dressed in all pale blue her hand spreads out covering her mouth and she's trying not to cry. "she came earlier this year to the same result. We would recommend therapy? Olivia is doing good in school and sports but she is quiet and refuses to make contact with both of you. That worries us,"

Miranda presses her lips and shakes her head, "I'll decide what you should worry about. Just

Both women let the summer pass and a new term commence. They will let her have time, she reminds them of themselves perhaps, who else would she be like?

"Andrea?" Miranda answers her phone in late November.

"Miranda," Andrea's voice is again raspy and then there is a silence… "I want to tell you so many things."

Miranda breathes into the phone, "tell me."

"I miss you," it is as if she wanted to start the longest conversation but was afraid she'd run out of words, or breath or time.

Miranda doesn't answer, "Olivia sent a postcard. I suppose that's a start," Andrea says because she does not know what to fill the silence with. She had not called to talk about Olivia. She would like to talk about Olivia, she would like to talk about their shared daughter like normal couples did. She would like to talk about the price of avocado and how much they hated traffic.

"I'm in New York," Andrea says and again Miranda's heart beats wildly. She tells herself that she should not. She is not allowed to hope, she will end disillusioned like last time. She does not deserve to hope but she does anyway. She hopes against her better judgment because her body does if for her. She sits down on her desk, and feels the pit of her stomach fall.

"Oh," she whispers.

"I came for the peace symposium."

"Oh," Miranda whispers again. If it wasn't such a fragile moment Andrea would joke that her responses are not eloquent. If so much wasn't hanging on the line, she would say that she does not understand how Elias Clarke keeps her as editor.

"I could have sent anyone Miranda," Andrea explains.

Miranda wants to understand. She imagines the words that come next but does not dare to put them together.

"Would you have dinner with me?" the younger woman asks and Miranda nods before she can answer, "Yes."

"I'm staying at the Plaza, the main restaurant. I'll have them make a reservation? Seven?"

'I'll be there."

Miranda arrives before Andrea, thirty minutes to be exact. Andrea arrives ten minutes late, looking slightly frazzled in dark washed jeans and a black turtleneck. Miranda wears a grey wool coat and a black wrap dress.

"Miranda, I … I didn't know what to wear," the brown- haired woman confesses and it is almost cause for laughter. Two highly successful women, nervous over dinner.

"Andrea, you would look good in anything," Miranda wants to say she looks beautiful but she doesn't want to overstep.

"I miss you," the lawyer repeats.

"Not here Andrea," Miranda whispers painfully.

Andrea inhales, "I don't know what to talk about?" she smiles. Her smile is pure and clean and just as the older woman remembers.

They talk about the weather, and Olivia. No one orders steak or sole, they settle for pasta and a few glasses of wine. They talk about Paris fashion week and the new president. They tread lightly on everything, it is a game. They are playing charades.

"They have a beautiful view of the city in the back balcony, but I'm sure you have seen it," Andrea mentions. It is an invitation if Miranda is coy enough to take it. Miranda looks at Andrea with wonder. She is afraid the night will end, the sun will rise taking today with it. This night will fade into fantasy just like their love, like Mexico. A memory to archive into her mind.

"I haven't seen it lately," Miranda drops.

"Walk with me?" Andrea asks.

They do.

"I came for you Miranda," Andrea says.

She pulls away a strand from Miranda's hair. It is the same as she remembers back at the Nevada. Shoulder length, strait with volume. It suits her, makes her look more intellectual, not that she would ever look bad.

She tries to lean in, Miranda puts her hand to push her away, "Andrea, don't." she says.

"If you kiss me right now, and then leave tomorrow or the day after. I don't think I could stand it," her words are slow, punctuating the air, they are soft and come in full shallow breaths. "Andrea, it has taken so long to get here, to this passive feeling. When you left me in the airport, it took every ounce of strength, everything I had left to not follow you. To get on the plane and let you be. You left me there and all these ideas I had of what our life would look like. I had seen us spending summers in the beach house, raising Olivia together, of us in New York, of trips to Paris or Rome or Chicago. I had this vision of who we were going to be. You left me and took it all with you.

I had to fight to not come after you, to not knock on your door again. To understand you needed to be, that I had broken your heart, that I had hurt you."

"That is not why I left, " Andrea interrupts.

"Back then it took a long time, days, nights, months to be strong for the girls, for Olivia for myself. It took a long time, I loved you Andrea. I loved you more than I ever though loving was possible. I dare say I had never loved until I met you, truly loved. You broke my heart, I could hear it break amidst the journalist standing … "

They both stay quiet, there are tears streaming from Miranda's diamond eyes.

"I didn't even think that was possible, hearts breaking like that. If you kiss me, if I let you, if I let myself hope and I follow you into your room or wherever this," she signals to the two of them, "is going. If you tomorrow decide that you can't forgive me, or you don't want to face the world, the media, if you can't do everything that comes with me. If you can't fight your morals, or your faith or your family for me. If you don't want to sacrifice your humanitarian work, if you're not willing to live here for some time, if you leave Andrea! If you leave this broken heart, mended with string and barely holding, this heart resting upon itself to keep beating won't stand it. I don't think I could survive it my beautiful Andrea."

"Miranda, I came for you… I won't leave."

"No, Andrea I don't want you to promise anything here. I can only imagine the solitude of having Olivia away puts everything into different perspectives. She will come around, she loves you I am sure of it. And when she does maybe you will realize you don't really need me."

"That is not why,"

Miranda puts her hand up again, she leans over the railing to see the breathtaking city, the night contrasting the multitude of lights that shine. The view of the park that is nothing but trees and water and yet people pay millions of dollars to say they own the view.

"I want you to go home Andrea, go home and think all this over. I want you to do whatever you enjoy doing, tell your parents that you love me. If you decide you still want this. I want you to be sure, and if you still want to I will always be here waiting for you."

Andrea nods, "I understand Miranda."

"I… Happy thanksgiving," the younger companion whispers and trails her fingers slightly over her ex-lover's arm.

Andrea flies to see Oliva. It has been months since her daughter spoke to her.

"Miss Sachs," the headmistress shakes her head, "tell her I'm not leaving until she comes down. Tell her I went to see Miranda."

The girl comes.

"Are you going to forgive yourself?" the young girl asks. The question surprises Andrea in the way it is posed. She doesn't' ask if she has forgiven Miranda because the young girl has understood that the reason why Andrea left her wife was because she had not forgiven herself. She has understood that beliefs weight much more than love sometimes. Wars have been waged for religion. Fortunes squandered, lives laid down in the name of ageless churches proclaiming to know what is wrong and right.

She tilts her head, and asks again, "are you going to tell grandma? If the only reason is grandma you should tell her."

"you are so much like your mother," Andrea tells her.

"Which of the three?" the child jokes.

"All of us, you are so much like all of us," Andrea smiles and she also understands her own mother. She feels sorry that they are so different, that they were always at odds. She wishes she could be the perfect daughter Anastasia deserved, like her older sister. She really tried. And then she wishes she could have a mother that would have understood, that would have supported her always, like she would always support Oliva. She suspects that is the same reason Natalie made her promise she would not give Olivia away to the Aster family.

"I'm ready to come home, at the end of the year," Olivia announces while her adoptive mother is pondering all the preceding's of the last week. She smiles, broad and happy.

"I'm so glad Olivia," she breathes.

Andrea goes home alone. She tells Maria everything that has happened. Maria holds the medal of the Virgin Mary she always wears around her neck while she speaks, "Mrs. Miranda loves you very much. She sends you those nice jewels." Andrea laughs.

"You are very sad without her."

They drink tequila again.

Andrea lets the months sink away again. She busies herself with work. She works indirectly with the Human Rights Coalition, she owns a nonprofit called 'Indigenous Lives' that rallies for the rights of the native Indians that inhabit Mexico, in the beginning they fought for basic rights, education, freedom, equal pay and regaining the stolen lands. Eight years after many still don't have their little plots or homes.

The organization provides free legal help as well as education for children in remote or inner-city areas and food when necessary. Olivia tells her mother that she wants to help, she wants to fund a scholarship for disadvantaged youth to be able to go to college. She starts with only one, asking donations from her boarding school friends who drop money like nothing.

In time, her little-girl project will grow into a full-pledged extension of the organization called

Natalia's College Fund in honor of her mother, sending hundredths of indigenous young adults to college in Mexico and Internationally for science careers. At that precise moment in time however Olivia did not know it yet.

Six months go by, before Andrea picks up the phone again and dials Miranda. She calls her office again.

"Miranda's office," the assistant a different one no doubt answers.

"I need to talk to Miranda, this is Andrea Sachs," she opts for her name.

"Andrea?" the pick-up takes a long time. Andrea was about to hang up. She isn't sure if it's deliberate, if Miranda was busy, if the assistant was incompetent.

"I thought I had gotten disconnected," Andrea ponders out loud.

"The truth is I thought of not answering," Miranda confesses candidly. She's got nothing to lose. She convinced herself that she had been right, Andrea had been taken by loneliness, a moment of desire, the ashes of what was. She had been sure of it, when she saw that Andrea went back to work, when she saw her in the cable news she watched about Mexico. The organization had moved to some new legislation to release old records and give lands back. It was an unpopular move with the nation's elite but Mexico was surprisingly a more transparent country since the war and change was a possibility. She had been even happier when Olivia had returned, forgiven them both and promised Miranda she would visit for fall again.

"Oh, well that would be your decision," Andrea answers hurt.

"How is Olivia?"

"Olivia is good, I called to tell you that I talked to my mother. I went to visit her and told her the truth. I told her everything," there is radio silence from the other side.

"I still want you Miranda, not just for a night, not just to have you again on my bed," as she says it the thought of Miranda under her plague her mind and she smiles running her hands over her thighs, "I mean I do want that too, but more than anything I still want to be married to you not just on a paper and a few rings but in everyday reality."

"I see," Miranda answers, "and you've thought about the press? They will hound you Andrea. It isn't like last time. The press does not have wars to cover and returning heroes. They will follow you and ask you about us, and the past, and the separation and the betrayal and everything. They will unearth everything about Olivia and your family. They will have no mercy."

"I know."

"And you have thought about your work?"

"Yes."

"You've thought about having to actually live in New York for a few months at least? You've thought that I will want you here? Or I will be there with you? You've thought about Olivia and your organization?

"Yes,"

"And you are sure?"

"I am,"

"Well … okay."

The call was simple, everything else was not. It was hell. It was hell on Earth. The press, the move, the readjusting. It was complicated but it was worth every single thing.

Waking up with Miranda, watching their three daughters talk and joke. Watching Caroline get married. Walking down the street in New York, flanked by a few body guards but holding Miranda's hand none the less. Spending summers in the Hamptons. Hearing Miranda a few years later give her goodbye speech and retire to live in Los Angeles with Andrea, having her help in the nonprofit. Her and Caroline work with indigenous women to help them design Mexican inspired couture. Watching Cassidy become a member of the UN and Olivia follow in Natalie's footsteps and become a doctor.

There were still days when Andrea went to church and still felt guilt. She was still afraid her grandmother would be disappointed, like her mother had been. She felt afraid that God would be disappointed. That she was not worthy of heaven. Those days still existed, brooded over her like a dark cloud but she fought them. There were days when Miranda doubted that Andrea truly loved her, truly had forgiven her, doubted this peaceful happiness they had found in the California waves. There were days when Olivia wishes she could mourn her mother in a grave instead of a monument to the fallen lives of the war. There were days when Caroline and Cassidy could not comprehend everything that had happened in their once ordinary lives. There are dark days for all of them, but the truth that this whole twist to their lives had been uncharted, like war terrain, like new chapters, like undrawn maps and unsung songs.

Yet, saying she was Andrea Priestly-Sachs made the storms worth every drop of rain.


End file.
